

i;iii->, 



11 



i 






Class JPS^iM 
Book^i! 



Copyright N"_ 



1 1 1 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



POEMS. 



Books hy 
HARRIET McEWEN KIMBALL 

Hymns, 1866 
Swallow Flights, 1874 
The Blessed Company, 1879 
Poems, 1889, 1911 



HARRIET McEWEN KIMBALL 



POEMS 



BY 



HARRIET McEWEN KIMBALL 



BOSTON 

LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 

1911 






Copyright, i88g, igii, 
By Harriet McEwen Kimball. 



All rights reserved 
Published, November, 191 1 



THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U. S. A. 



©CI.A297956 



TO 

WILLIAM WINTER 

WHO MORE THAN ANY LIVING WRITER HAS ENRICHED 

AMERICAN LITERATURE 

WITH THE MANIFOLD PRODUCTIONS OF HIS CLASSIC 

PEN, AND BY WHOSE FRIENDSHIP I HAVE BEEN 

ENRICHED FOR MORE THAN HALF 

A CENTURY 

I DEDICATE THIS BOOK 



CONTENTS, 



RELIGIOUS AND CONTEMPLATIVE. 

FAOB 

AU'sWeU 3 

The Guest 4 

Omniscience 6 

Intercession 8 

His Chosen Ones 10 

Jesus, My Refuge j 11 

The Blessed Company 13 

The Early Mass 17 

Discouragement 18 

"Thou Art a Place to Hide Me In" 21 

The Uneventful Days 22 

The Procession 24 

The Vision in the Chalice 25 

Security 28 

An Almoner of Christ 30 

Faith 34 

In Paradise . . ; 36 

The Magnificat 38 

The House of God 39 

"Anima Christi" 45 

" I will never Leave Thee nor Forsake Thee " ... 46 

Quicken Thou Me 49 

Hymn of Adoration 50 

My Field 52 

Apprehension 53 



Vlll CONTENTS, 

PAGE 

*' Give US Thia Day our DEiily Bread" 55 

The Way of Thorns 57 

The Monk of La Trappe 59 

His Peace 62 

The Bride of Christ 64 

"It is I" 67 

When I Awake 68 

Anxiety 70 

The Perfect Friend 72 

"Couldlbut Have Thee back Again" 74 

"Him that Cometh to Me I will in no wise Cast out" 76 

In the Garden 78 

The Two Cities 81 

"No one Taketh your Peace away" 84 

The Waning Year 86 

Vale 89 

OCCASIONAL. 

FEAST AND FASTS OF THE CHURCH, ETC. 

The Nativity 93 

"The sweetest Hymn that ever was sung" .... 99 

Mary Mother 101 

"This is the True God" 102 

"Endedthe VigHof Ages" 104 

Christmas Carol 107 

"There was no Room for them in the Inn" .... 109 

Hymn for Good Friday Ill 

A Meditation 113 

Calvary 114 

The Resurrection 115 

"Sing ye lowly, Sing ye great" 118 

*'Sun-Day that miethaU Sundays with Ught" ... 120 



CONTENTS. ix 

The Transfiguration 122 

Missionary Processional 124 

SONNETS. 

PAGB 

To John Greenleaf Whittier 129 

"He opened not His mouth" 130 

A Woodland Hour 131 

* ' Save that there may be one Love-Garnering Breast " 132 

Prophecy 133 

The Morning Chamber 134 

Inscribed to J. W. and C. H. 136 

MISCELLANEOUS. 

At the Stand of the Tide 141 

The FHght of the Birds 143 

My Namesake 144 

Friends 146 

White Azaleas 149 

Midwinter Days 150 

The Lilacs 152 

In Spring-Time 153 

Love's Visitation 155 

The Doves 157 

Song 159 

My Dream 160 

AVigU 163 

Confirmation 164 

Summer-Time 166 

Cradle Songs 167 

Sweet-Peas 170 

Incognita 173 

Heliotrope 174 

Day-Lilies 175 

The Crickets 178 

The Lingering October Weather 179 



X CONTENTS, 

PAGE 

Knitting Song , 181 

Love for Love 183 

Dedication of a Guest-Book 184 

Two Men 186 

The Baby I Love 187 

Lines written in a House-Book 189 

Returned 190 

In Autumn 191 

My Picture 195 

The Home Among the Hills . 197 

A Harvest Hymn 199 

To John Greenleaf Whittier on his Eightieth Birthday 201 

Woman (1862) 203 

Abraham Lincoln (1865) 206 

Epitaph on Albert Laighton 208 



ACKNOWLEDGMENT. 

The author wishes to acknowledge the courtesy of The 
Century Company in granting permission to reprint in 
this collection the poem " My Picture." 



RELIGIOUS AND CONTEMPLATIVE. 



ALL'S WELL. 

'T^HE day is ended. Ere I sink to sleep, 
•^ My weary spirit seeks repose in Thine. 
Eatker ! forgive my trespasses, and keep 
This little life of mine. 

With loving-kindness curtain Thou my bed. 
And cool in rest my burning pilgrim-feet ; 
Thy pardon be the pillow for my head ; 
So shall my sleep be sweet. 

At peace with all the world, dear Lord, and Thee, 
No fears my soul's unwavering faith can shake ; 
All 's well, whichever side the grave for me 
The morning light may break. 

3 



THE GUEST. 



Behold, I stand at the door and knock : if any man hear 
my voice and open the door, I will come in to him, and will 
sup with him, and he with me. — Rev. iii. 20. 

OPEECHLESS Sorrow sat with me; 

*^ I was sighing wearily ; 

Lamp and fire were out ; the rain 

Wildly beat the window-pane. 

In the dark I heard a knock, 

And a hand was on the lock. 

One in waiting spake to me, 

Saying sweetly, 
^*I am come to sup with thee." 

All my room was dark and damp ; 
" Sorrow," said I, " trim the lamp, 
Light the fire, and cheer thy face, 
Set the guest-chair in its place." 
And again I heard the knock ; 
In the dark I found the lock : 
" Enter, I have turned the key, — 

Enter, Stranger, 
Who art come to sup with me." 
4 



THE GUEST. 

Opening wide the door he came, 
But I could not speak his name ; 
In the guest-chair took his place, 
But I could not see his face. 
When my cheerful fire was beaming, 
When my little lamp was gleaming, 
And the feast was spread for three, 

Lo, my Master 
Was the Guest that supped with me ! 



OMNISCIENCE. 

npHE door is shut and yet Thou enterest in, 
^ Without or lifting latch or loosening bar ! 
Friends who have known me best and longest win 

No entrance here ; but only stand afar 
Oblivious of the hiding places deep 
Where I myself unconsciously do keep. 

Thou enterest in, Lord, Omnipotent, 
Omniscient, Omnipresent, yet unseen ; 

Thy patient eyes upon me ever bent ; 
No faintest mist hung piteously between 

To veil my thoughts or my infirmities 

From those all-searching and long-suffering eyes. 

As I am seen could I but gaze on Thee 

Awful in majesty and royal might, 
Yet as a lamb in love's simplicity, 

And as a spotless lamb of matchless white. 

So kingly yet so lowly ! — could I see, 

What, my Saviour, would become of me! 
6 



OMNISCIENCE. 7 

This, this I know ; no word of self-excuse 

For any fault of mine my tongue could frame ; 

Nay, more ; for very shame I should refuse 

The shield, if there could be a shield from blame ; 

And all the love that human breast can know 

Would at Thy feet lay me forever low I 



INTEECESSIOK 

T T 7HY should we pray alone for those whose 
^ ^ faces 

Our eyes behold ; for those we think are near ; 
Or those who dwelling in remoter places 
Are yet accounted Here ? 

God builds no walls of time or space to sever; 

'T is we who put each other far away ; 
Who live in Christ, or Here or There, must ever 
For one another pray. 

The bond our human hearts so oft have tested 

Is not a rope of sand, a thing of earth ; 
And prayer is love's own language, and invested 
AVith a mysterious worth. 

How near the world's horizons are ! How nearer 

The borders fair of Paradise the blest ! 
Our dear ones Here, and — only grown the 
dearer — 
Our dear ones There, at rest. 

blessed hope that triumphs over distance ! 

O faith that trembles on the brink no more ! 
O love that girds its loins with glad insistence 

And finds the unseen shore I 

8 



INTERCESSION. 9 

O Very Man ! The Lord of Life unending! 

With Thee for all who live in Thee we plead ; 
Since Thou our Pattern to Thy throne ascending 
Livest to intercede. 



HIS CHOSEN ONES. 

OOME souls tliere are beloved of God, 
^ Who, following where the saints have trod, 
Learn such surrender of the will 
They seem insensible of ill. 

Yet finely strung and sensitive 
They live far more than others live, 
And griefs and pain's experience 
Must be to them far more intense. 

O mystery that such can know 
A life impregnable to woe ! 
O paradox that God alone 
In secret proveth to His own ! 

It must be that supremest grace 
So nerves them for the heavenly race 
Their litanies are turned to psalms, 
Their crosses, even here, to palms. 
10 



JESUS, MY EEFUGE. 

TESTIS, my Kefuge, to the secret places 

Where Thou dost hide I flee, 
To learn Thy blessed Truth, from all the mazes 
Of human thought set free. 

Without denial and without refraining 

I must receive Thy word j 
Not what Thou meanest after man's explaining, 

But what Thou sayest, Lord. 

Shut from the strife of tongues that yield con- 
fusion 

Quick grows the inward ear 
Thy sweet assurance, stripped of all delusion, 

In humble faith to hear. 

In mysteries beyond the dim perceiving 

Of Reason's clouded eyes. 
Thou dost reveal Thyself to souls believing. 

Too loving for disguise, 

II 



12 JESUS, MY REFUGE. 

And oh, how loving, dearest Lord, how tender 

Beyond all love Thou art 
When to Thy feet we cling in full surrender, 

With sorrow-broken heart ! 

Absolving, healing, strengthening, uniting. 

Through sacramental grace. 
And to communion closer yet inviting, 

Thou dost unveil Thy face. 

For faith alone low-kneeling in contrition 

The load of sin grows light ; 
To faith alone Thou dost vouchsafe that vision, 

And faith is almost sight. 



"THE BLESSED COMPANY OF ALL 
FAITHFUL PEOPLE.'' 

T3 ETWEEN the gray dawn and the golden day 

•*-^ Methought low murmurs troubled all the 

land, — 

Disquietude and strife where should be peace, 

In the white tents of that sweet Prince of Peace 

Whose hosts encamp amidst " a naughty world/' 

As swelled the murmurs, under all I heard 

The sighing of the leaders, men of prayer, 

Steadfast in faith, though sometimes faint of voice, 

Worn with the heat and burden of the day, 

And the half-hearted zeal of many a rank ; 

And harsh above their sighings louder rose 

The sounds of party and opposing speech, 

And louder yet the petty-tongued complaints 

Of such as had not learned obedience. 

That first, last law for these rebellious hearts, 

Given of God and taught of Holy Church. 

Anon, and piercing all the clamor through, 

The Lord's own heralds blew their bugle-notes ; 

For He would set the faithful in array. 

Then sudden silence made a little space 

For the One Voice that fills the universe, 

And Christ's own roll-call swept the white camp 

through. 

13 



14 THE BLESSED COMPANY OF 

And lo ! tlie faithful noiseless moved as thought 

Kesponsive, yet unconscious of response, 

Their rapt eyes lifted to the shining morn, 

As seeing Him who is invisible. 

He named them, clan by clan, His chosen ones : 

The poor in spirit, and the souls that mourn, 

The meek, and those for righteousness athirst, 

The merciful, the pure in heart, the just. 

The valiant, the forbearing, named He thus. 

Eor every clan a benediction sweet, 

And sweeter promises of victory, thus : — 

Blessed are the poor, 

Jesus spake ; 

Poor in spirit for My sake ; 

Who seek the glory of this world no more, 

Nor gather riches that shall fly away ; 

Of the heavenly kingdom heirs are they. 

Blessed, 

Blessed they who mourn, He said ; 

Precious are the tears they shed, 

The ashes on the bowed head. 

All their sins confessed. 

They shall be comforted. 

Blessed are the meek, 

Who seek 

The Father's will in quietness and peace, 

Caring little for all things beside ; 



ALL FAITHFUL PEOPLE. 15 

They shall increase, 

And with the fulness of the earth be satisfied. 

Blessed they, He said, 

After righteousness an-hungered ; 

Blessed they whose thirst 

The pleasures of this world accurst 

Have not stilled ; 

With My bread 

Shall the famished be fed ; 

With My wine the parched lips be filled. 

Blessed, blessed they 

The merciful, whose ears 

Are swift to hear the crying of distress ; 

Soft as the rain in summer fall their tears ; 

Their place is found beside the fatherless. 

Yea, 

Blessed they 

To whom the outcast and the poor complain 

Not in vain ; 

Mercies numberless 

They hereafter shall obtain. 

Blessed are the pure in heart. He said, 
Whose feet the paths of holiness do tread, 
Whose looks are God-ward, and whose hands are 

clean ; 
Through glories manifold 
Shall they behold 
Him whom no eye hath seen. 



16 TEE BLESSED COMPANY, 

Blessed they who seek 

To turn all strife to peace, 

Whose words are as a covert to the weak, 

Who make the anger of the strong to cease j 

Children of God shall they 

Be called for aye. 

Blessed they who steadfast stand 

Through persecutions dread, 

Though on every hand 

The wicked bend the bow 

To lay them low ; 

Theirs the kingdom never vanquished. 

Blessed ye when men revile 

And persecute you falsely for My sake ; 

Ye who, walking without guile, 

With Me partake 

Shame and scorn awhile. 

Yea, rejoice. 

Ye who fly not from the arrows of the strong ; 

Be exceeding glad, for unto you is given 

Great reward in heaven ; 

Even now lift up your voice 

In victorious song ; 

For so persecuted they 

The prophets in their day : 

Again rejoice. 

Then all the winds of heaven : Amen! Amen! 



THE EAELY MASS. 

'T^O rise betimes and go my way 
■■■ While yet the world around is still; 
To Him Who in the hush of day 
Will come my needy soul to fill ; 

To taste and see how graciously 
On those who seek He doth bestow, 
Then from the Altar's mystery 
Laden with benediction go ; 

Returning oft till eventide, 
In heart if not in very deed 
Still in His Presence to abide, 
Still on His Very Presence feed. 

17 



DISCOUEAGEMENT. 

T OBD, when I strive to serve Thee most, 
-'-^ Yet toil in vain ; 
When I can see but labor lost, 
Instead of gain ; 

When plans fall out another way 

Erom what seems best, 
And failure comes though I obey 

Thy clear behest j 

When hopes whereon I dare to lean 

Thou dost deny ; 
When Thou forbiddest me to glean 

The fields hard by ; 

When fairest prospects opening wide 

Before mine eyes, 
Thou wallest in on every side. 

And mountains rise 

That faith seems powerless to remove, — 

Then, dearest Lord, 
Draw near to me, draw near and prove 

Thy written Word ! 
18 



DIS CO URAGEMENT. 19 

That Thou in all things dost ordain 

Thy children's good ; 
That joy shall be the fruit of pain 

When understood, 

I know, and yet (0 slow of heart !) 

But half believe ; 
And when I fail in secret smart, 

And fret, and grieve. 

Ml me with faith's divine content 

In Thee, O Lord, 
And make me willing to be spent 

Without reward ! 

Yea, Lord, without one smallest gain, 

Though sought alone 
For others' good, by toil and pain, 

Not for mine own. 

And when my failures cast me down, 

Make me to rest, 
Not in the thought of any crown, 

But on Thy breast. 

The weary sea-bird goes to sleep 

On tossing waves, 
Untroubled by the storm, the deep, 

In trust that saves. 



20 ^^S CO URA GEMENT, 

It is the hollow of Thy hand 
That shapes its nest ; 

So, though I may not understand. 
Make me to rest. 



"THOU AET A PLACE TO HIDE 
ME IN." 

T X 7ITH0UT I hear the heating of the rain, 
^ ^ The howling winds that tell the storm's 
increase ; 
covert sure that he who seeks may gain ! — 
Within ahideth peace ! 

Without I hear the sound of feet that halt, 

And grope and stumble in the blinding night ; 
blessed faith that serveth in default 
Of what men call the light ! 

O rest, wayside inn, where home is not 

For the poor pilgrim to that city fair 
Where strife shall cease and doubtings be forgot ! 
The Lamb, the Light is there ! 

21 



THE UNEVENTFUL DAYS. 

T/^ 7HEN sorrow comes I fly to Thee, 
^ ^ The only refuge sorrow knows, 
And prostrate at Thy feet, dear Lord, 
Kecall Thy own unfathomed woes. 

When joy is mine a flood of light 
Awakes my soul to heavenly things, 

And psalms of glad thanksgiving lend 
To every thought devotion's wings. 

But when the noiseless weeks go by. 
Unmarked by any conscious change. 

How doth their uneventfulness 

My careless heart from Thee estrange ! 

Yet verily to just such days 
Do lengthened litanies belong, 

And psalms of never-faltering praise 
In alternations sweet and strong. 

Not when the waters overwhelm. 
Or glad surprises lift our head. 

Do we most need to feel Thee near. 
Dear Giver of our daily bread! 

22 



THE UNEVENTFUL DAYS. 23 

Each night the solemn threshold is 
Of something never known before ; 

Each morning for our sandalled feet 
Thou swingest wide another door. 

Each moment is in very truth 
A moment of unguessed suspense, 

And sleepless fear and gratitude 

Should be the faithful souFs defence. 

Nearer and nearer should she draw 
In ceaseless prayer, in ceaseless praise, 

And hide the closer, Lord, with Thee 
Through these the uneventful days. 



THE PEOCESSIOK 

'T^HEOUGH one mysterious gate not far away 
•^ A long procession passes day by day, 
Like a vast army through a dim defile, 
And vanishes — mysterious mile by mile. 

It has no break, recruiting as it goes, 

But when or where, though watching, no one 

knows. 
Noiseless and shadow-like it passes on ; 
It ever goeth, but is never gone. 

" How long, Lord ! " I sometimes dare to sigh ; 
And hear His own long-suffering reply : 
*' All things that are against My will,'^ He saith, 
" Shall surely cease ; there shall heno more deathP 

24 



THE VISIOK m THE CHALICE. 

npHE priest before the Altar 
■'- Stood with uplifted eyes, 
His heart deep stirred within him, 
To offer the sacrifice. 

The morning's golden splendor 

Through the chancel window streamed 
Till like masses of precious jewels 

The radiant colors seemed. 

But around the central picture 
Of the Christ upon the E-ood 

It shone like a wondrous halo 
As the priest upgazing stood. 

The prayer of consecration 

Began he low and clear, 
And at the mystic sentence 

Bowed down in holy fear ; 

Bowed lowly over the Paten, 

As he took in his hands the Bread ; 

And likewise the mystic sentence 
Over the Cup he said. 

25 



26 THE VISION IN THE CHALICE. 

When lo ! in the golden Chalice, 

Distinct in the purple wine, 
He saw reflected the image 

Of the Crucified IForm Divine. 

mied with a sudden tremor, 

His eyes deep fixed on the sight, 
Scarcely the prayer he followed 

Or knew if he said it aright. 

Tremhling with adoration 

He lifted the Chalice high, 
As upholding the sacred Burden 

Between the earth and the sky. 

And still when the Chalice he lowered. 

Distinct in the purple wine, 
From the chancel windows reflected 

He saw the Image Divine. 

Did he hear in the hush that followed 

The words of the Lord anew, 
Brought down hy the Church through the ages. 

The mystical charge, " This do " ? 

Did he hear from the Holy of holies. 

The secret, eternal shrine, 
The Priest who is Priest forever 

Kenew the assurance divine ? — 



TEE VISION IN THE CHALICE, 27 

" Lo ! I am with, you alway, 

Blessing the Cup that you bless ; 

Under the Bread you have broken 
My Presence proclaim and confess. 

" Lo ! I am with you alway, 

Mine own command to fulfil ; 
I am the Sacrifice offered, 

The Priest and the Victim still. 

*' Lo ! I am with you alway, 
Feeding the flock that you feed, 

My Flesh the manna unfailing, 
My Blood the drink indeed.'' 

O blessed, O wondrous commission ! 

It seemed to the lowly priest 
Like a precious new revelation, 

As he shared with his flock that Feast. 

And ever enshrined in his bosom 

He treasures with holy awe 
The memory of the vision 

That veiled in the Chalice he saw . 



SECUEITY. 

T^EEP in the grass tlie trustful lark 
^~^^ Conceals its lowly nest, 
Where cruel eye may seldom mark 
Or cruel hand molest. 

At least approach of footsteps rude 

The little bird upsprings ; 
Prom solitude to solitude 

It soars on swiftest wings. 

Far up the azure height it soars 
Beyond the reach of wrong, 

And from its modest breast outpours 
Its rapt, entrancing song. 

Thus dwells the pious soul secure, 

In meditation blest ; 
The foot of pride, ambition's lure. 

Scarce find the hidden nest. 

And when the tempter draweth near, 
His faintest footsteps heard, 

Swift on the wings of holy fear 
She soars as soars the bird. 
28 



SECURITY. 29 

Free in the vast encircling sky 

Of God's protecting grace, 
She pours her matchless song on high 

Of thankfulness and praise. 



AN ALMONEE OF CHEIST. 

"\7^0U will wonder, but, friend, believe it — 
-^ This sweet tale that I am fain to tell ; 
We of little faith can scarce conceive it, 
But this miracle a priest befell. 

Hidden in his breast for swift bestowing 
His last bit of money waiting lay ; 

For on Christ's own errands ever going, 
In His Name he gave it all away. 

Bit by bit his Master still supplied him 
Who his face turned not from any poor; 

Niggard souls there are who might deride him, 
But no blessing enters at their door ! 

God, who knoweth, sends just such a servant 
On His secret service serving Him; 

Slothful souls like us, and unobservant, 
Cannot see the way ; our faith is dim. 

Well, this good priest on his round of duty, 
Sad at heart upon that summer day. 

In the heat that scorched the summer's beauty 
Sought the bedside wherdf^ a young girl lay. 
30 



AN ALMONER OF CHRIST. 31 

Life and death on either hand beholding, 

'T was not strange that she for life besought ; 

Life for her meant love and joy's enfolding, 
Death the bringing of her youth to naught! 

''Pray," she whispered, " pray I may recover ! " 
Life to her was everything most kind ; 

Earth one rose, and every friend a lover ; 
She too young or thorn or flaw to find. 

So he prayed, as saints pray, gently pleading, 
Seeing on her brow the signs of death ; 

Tor her endless welfare interceding 

While he begged for her this mortal breath. 

As God's priest, his holy mission ended, 
Prom that bed he turned with tears away ; 

Through the stifling streets unconscious wended. 
Save that something seemed his steps to stay. 

Could he do no more to bless or cheer her, 
No small thing upon the earthly side. 

Just to bring his heart to her heart nearer 
While she lingered — lingered, though denied ! 

Pleasant Nature's vintage to the taste is, 
Sweet the fruit of orchard or of vine ; 

Hasting with such haste as sorrow's haste is. 
Bought he luscious pear and peach and wine. 



32 AN ALMONER OF CHRIST. 

" Just (within himself he said) in token 
That my thoughts are with her night and 
day ! " 

All that bit of money quite unbroken 
■ Spent he for the child who dying lay. 

Homeward then he sped, but ithoughtless 
thrusting 

In his breast his hand, what did he find ? — 
He, who ever giving, ever trusting. 

Saw the light where lesser souls are blind ! 

Lo ! his bit of money, spent, returned him ! 

Could it be ? Ah, no ! he failed to pay ! 
Back he went — what though the hot sun burned 
him, 

And had smitten strong men down that day ! 

Vendor, chemist, back to each he hasted, 
For each purchase fain would pay anew ; 

" ISTay, you paid ! you paid ! " they each pro- 
tested, 
" I 'm not one who 11 take what is not due ! " 

* ' Did I pay ? " the good priest answered, trem- 
bling, 

All his soul within him strangely stirred j 
Then, as if unawed, his awe dissembling. 

Dared he say to them no further word ! 



AN ALMONER OF CHRIST. 33 

'T was his last, that bit of mouey ; knowing 
This, he knew that it had been restored j 

And between a guard of angels going 
He with them could only praise the Lord ! 



FAITH. 

T^AEK as a dungeon my chamber 
•'-^ As, rising, I grope my way 
Step by step to the window- 
That faces the far-off day. 

So black is the night that I see not 

Even the window bars, 
Nor, straining my vision upward, 

The palest glimmer of stars. 

No faintest breath in the branches 
Buried in caverns of gloom ; 

Even the rote of the ocean 
Is hushed as the coming of doom. 

Nothingness, nothingness reigneth 
Above me, beneath and around ; 

A limitless realm of blackness, 
A fathomless absence of sound. 

Unreal, untenable seemeth 
Even the spot where I stand ; 

Lifting in trial before me 
My undiscernible hand. 
34 



FAITH. 36 

And yet, bewildered and baffled, 

One consciousness keepeth its sway ; 

I know, I am sure that my window 
Faces the far-off day ! 



m PAEADISE. 

/^ MY beloved ones, 
^-^ How long did I lament 
When " through, the grave and gate of death '' 
Out of this world you went! 

And still from sun to sun, 

From solemn eve to eve, 
How often I lament anew 

And for your presence grieve ! 

How often little thiugs 

Will your dear ways recall, 
And bring a mist before my eyes, 

A shadow over all ! 

And though I sometimes think 

You may be very near. 
It does not still the inward cry, 

'' If only they were here/ " 

Yet there are other times, 

Dark in themselves 't is true, 
When I am filled with thankfulness, 

Beloved ones, for you. 
36 



IN PARADISE 37 

When some sharp trial comes, 

When cruel things befall, 
Hardships and disappointed hopes — > 

You have escaped from all. 

You have escaped from all ! 

I say it o'er and o'er, 
With thankfulness in your behalf 

Impossible of yore. 

Sin is for you o'erpast, 

The needless fret, the strife, 
The failure and the weariness 

That crush this mortal life. 

A flood of joy flows in 

That drowns the sense of grief, 
As the fair vision of your peace 

Comes to my glad belief. 

I cease to wish you here ; 

Lead them, dear Lord, I say, 
Prom blessedness to blessedness 

On their immortal way. 



THE MAGNIFICAT. 

T OVELY was Eve in sinless Paradise 
■*— ' When God beheld her with approving eyes j 
But of transcendent loveliness was she 
Whose will His will reflected perfectly. 

In her pure breast, retrieving our estate, 
Another Paradise did He create ; 
And more than primal Fatherhood again 
Through Blessed Mary's Son bestow on men. 

What wonder that she sang the matchless Song 
That ages have prolonged and shall prolong 
Henceforth her matchless honor to proclaim, 
And men exalt her Ever- Virgin Name ! 

From day to day with every day's decline 
The Church repeats that Canticle divine, 
With countless tongues in glorious accord, — 
The Song of Mary, Mother of Our Lord ! 
38 



THE HOUSE OF GOD. 



'IpHE Lord's own Temple ! in His Holy Name 
-■■ What reverent steps its very pavements 

claim ! 
Oh, enter softly ! He who here abides 
From mortal eyes His form, His glory hides ; 
Yet all around in all these fair designs 
His Name is written in mysterious lines, 
And everywhere the sacred symbols speak 
Of Him whom all may find who truly seek. 
Here human art attains its loftiest reach. 
Eternal truths to shadow forth and teach ; 
And beauty here in sweet constraint doth dwell, 
Where every color teaches truth as well ; 
And even the unlettered here may learn, 
Led by Devotion's hand at every turn. 

These steadfast stones the " living stones " declare 
Whereof is built a temple far more fair, 
Whose corner-stone is Christ ; whose piers un- 
seen. 
The same to-day as they have ever been, 
Are Prophets and Apostles, — noble line. 
The Church's firm foundations to define ! 

39 



40 THE HOUSE OF GOD. 

Within these walls what peace! (Christ is our 

Peace !) 
What silence reigns where earthly noises cease ! 
Silence wherethrough we almost hear the sound 
Of angels thronging all the sacred ground. 

Here at the portal pause and reverent gaze : 

A holy order all the place displays. 

The triple length, the triple breadth and height 

Proclaim one mystery to the wondering sight, 

That, scaling pillar, arch, and window fair, 

Seeks the vast roof to find the One God there ; 

Then from that lofty height in awe descends 

To mark how majesty with mercy blends ; 

In nave and choir and transept arms stretched wide, 

Behold the symbol of the Crucified ; 

And in the kneeling throng, in mystery. 

His Body one with Him its Head on high, 

Sharing His Cross to share at last His Crown, — 

The Life He won for us through life laid down. 

See, many-hued and glorious the beams 
Of heavenly light that on the darkness streams, 
Reveals the blazoned pane, and lends a glow 
To recess dim and shadowed aisle below; 
An ever-shifting, never-changiug flood, 
To touch our every sense, our every mood ; 
As the sweet Gospel answers every need 
And on our darkness pours the light indeed ! 



THE HOUSE OF GOD. 41 

Here stands the Font, placed just within the door, 
To say to all who pass the threshold o'er : 
Ye who the Church of God would enter, know 
One only way our Saviour Christ did show — 
By holy baptism ; this the lowly gate 
For helpless infancy and man's estate ; 
For since God's grace alone can lead them in, 
Wisdom and age like babes must entrance win. 
Here stands the Font, and here the Heavenly Dove, 
Its depths to sanctify, on wings of love 
Hovers unseen. Beneath this cleansing wave 
Doth God regenerate whom He would save ; 
Through this fair tide He calleth all to pass 
Into His Kingdom ; this the sea of glass 
Before His altar-throne that far away 
Beyond the nave, the choir, in fair array, 
Within the rood-screen lifts its gleaming height. 
And floods the space around with sacred light. 
As the White Throne and He who sits thereon 
Fill Heaven with majesty above the sun. 
And like the rainbow round the Throne appear 
The changing colors of the Christian year 
As all the holy seasons come and go. 
And o'er the Altar hues symbolic throw. 
Eastward the nave extending mutely saith : 
Lo, there He rose triumphant over death ; 
The Light of Light, the Sun of Righteousness, 
Whom nations long in darkness hid confess. 
Thence He with all His angels shall descend 



4:2 THE HOUSE OF GOD. 

In tlie Great Day wlien time itself shall end ! 
Ever throngli solemn fast and gladsome feast 
The Church expectant worships toward the east, 
In prayers and praises mingling joy and dread 
Of Him who comes to judge both quick and dead, 
Who doth a place beside His Throne prepare 
For her, His Bride, to be exalted there, 
And keeps with her meanwhile His awful tryst 
Beneath the shadow of the Eucharist. 
The steps from nave to choir that upward lead 
Teach us humility, and bid us heed 
How we regard the Heaven-appointed priest 
Who at the altar serves ; though he be least 
'Mong men, he stand eth in the Lord's own stead 
When in His Name he breaks the holy Bread, 
And with the Hidden Manna duly feeds 
The hungry flock that follows where he leads. 
Yea, in the Name and Person of the Lord 
He breaks the Bread and he proclaims the Word ; 
'T is from his hand the stream Baptismal flows. 
Pardon he speaks and peace, Christ's peace, be- 
stows. 

Within the choir mark first the lectern stand, 
The stalls and prayer-desks ranged on either hand ; 
Here lies the Holy Book whose mysteries 
Are sealed to many a scholar great and wise, 
But to the children of the Kingdom yield 



THE HOUSE OF GOD, 43 

The priceless treasures even on earth revealed. 

Fair and more fair behold the place appear 

As to the holiest our feet draw near ; 

Each least detail how beautiful to trace, 

And learn the moulding touch of Heavenly grace. 

As unto Christ both Priest and Sacrifice 

The earth's wide ends must turn their countless 

eyes, 
So on the altar all the temple waits ; 
Here vision centres, worship culminates. 
To this His shrine the Church adoring brings 
Her richest gifts, her choicest offerings ; 
Her tribute gold, her myrrh of penitence, 
And in her praise the precious frankincense. 
And ever on " the altar trimmed aright " 
She tends with loving care each typic light, 
The God, the Man, unceasing to proclaim. 
While the mid-cross declares His saving Name. 
O House of God ! thy beauty half untold 
Is lost to many an eye that might behold. 
While many a tongue complains, " This might be 

sold 
And given to the poor ; '^ and men forget 
How like complaint by Christ HimseK was met, 
And fail to mark how they who fairest make 
His temple, love His poor for Jesus' sake. 
In proof whereof they consecrate with care 
Their gifts to them upon His altar fair, 
That they with Him and He with them may share. 



44 THE HOUSE OF GOD. 

Jesus, who hadst not where to lay Thy Head 
When Thou the pathways of Thy poor didst tread, 
Too mean for Thee the temples that we raise, 
Though echoing to centuries of praise ! 



"ANIMA CHEISTL" 

A PARAPHRASE. 

OOUL of Christ, unscathed by sin, 

^^ Touch me; make me white within! 

Sacred Body, mangled, slain, 

Save me ; suffer not in vain ! 

Blood of Christ, my " drink indeed," 

Stay me ; on thy strength I feed ! 

Water from that riven side. 

Wash me ; wash me, cleansing tide ! 

Holy wounds, my entrance win ; 

Sweetest place to hide me in ! 

Broken heart, my fortress be 

When the foe oppresseth me ! 

When at last I yield my breath, 

Jesus, bid me rise from death ! 

With Thy saints, a countless throng, 

Let me sing the endless song ; 

Ever and forevermore 

Love and laud Thee and adore ! 



45 



"I WILL NEVEE LEAVE THEE, NOR 
EOESAKE THEE." 

T T OW patient art Thou, dearest Lord, 
•^ -*- And how perverse am I ! 
Still day by day some other way 
To win me Thou dost try. 

Now under skies serenely bright 

Thou leadest me along, 
No cloud of ill my hopes to chill 

Or turn to sighs my song. 

And now Thou sufferest cruel storms, 

Misfortune's bitter blast. 
To lay me low that I may know 

Thy shelter o'er me cast. 

To-day companionships most sweet 

To every hour give wings. 
And morn and eve such visions weave 

As shadow Heavenly things. 
46 



"/ WILL NEVER LEAVE TIIEE.'' 47 

The visions fade ; bereft, cast down, 

As in some desert waste 
Thou leavest me that unto Thee 

My lonely heart may haste. 

The awful consciousness of sin 

Thou makest me to feel, 
The sickness dread of heart and head 

That only Thou canst heal. 

Thou dost oppress me till I fall 

Repentant at Thy feet, 
That on Thy breast I may find rest 

As undeserved as sweet. 

Again, to meditation's shade 

Thou lurest me aside. 
And truths wouldst teach beyond the reach 

Of any human guide, — 

Soft whispers of the Spirit's lore 

Whose wisdom saints attain ; 
But soon I say, " Some other day ! " 

And turn to what seems plain. 

How faithful art Thou, dearest Lord, 

But oh, how faithless I, 
That o'er and o'er and more and more 

Thy faithfulness I try ! 



48 "^ WILL NEVER LEAVE THEE.'' 

Ohj were Thy sweet commandments writ 

In this inconstant heart, 
It could not be that I from Thee 

Should ever walk apart ! 

That I should leave the only Friend 

Who will not me forsake, 
But still doth plead, and plead, and plead, 

As one whose heart must break ! 

Strive with me still, O Love Supreme ; 

Supremest Patience, strive ! 
Thou hast restored the lost, dear Lord, 

Hast made the dead alive ; 

And nothing is impossible 

To Thy Almightiness 
Whose glory found its boundless bound 

In such divine redress. 

Thou sure must win me in the end 

To Thy eternal claim. 
Who didst create, regenerate, 

And call me by Thy Name. 

The day must come, the blessed day. 

When I updrawn shall be. 
And on the Cross count all things loss, 

And dying live to Thee ! 



QUICKEN THOU ME. 



npHE thorn is budding into life again, 
-'- The quickened vine puts out its tender shoots, 
The warm, warm sunshine and the cool, cool rain 
Feeding their hidden roots. 



Sweet Spirit, entering where no eye can see, 

Keach this poor heart in all its waiting need, 
And like the thorn and vine my life shall be 
When Thou its roots dost feed. 

49 



A HYMN OF ADOEATIOK. 

JESUS, Jesus, Jesus, 
High and lowly Son ; 
Son of blessed Mary 

And of God in one ; 
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 
Hail, O Son ! 

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 
Living Bread Divine, 

Feast for holy hunger, 
Be that hunger mine ; 

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 
Bread Divine ! 

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 
Fount forever jBJled, 

In Thy streams of mercy 
Shall my thirst be stilled. 

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 
Fount once filled ! 

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 

Spotless Lamb once slain, 

Yet for us unceasing 

Offered again ; 
50 



A HYMN OF ADORATION. 51 

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 
Lamb once slain ! 

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 

Victim, Priest, and Lord ; 
Endless satisfaction 

Endlessly adored ; 
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 

Saviour, Lord ! 

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 

Name of names most sweet ; 
Tremble with thanksgiving. 

Tongue that may repeat — 
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 

Name most sweet. 

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 

God of God art Thou ; 
Low in adoration 

At Thy Name we bow ; 
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, 

God art Thou ! 

Father, Son, and Spirit, 

Blessed Three in One 
Whose unending praises 

Never were begun ; 
Holy, Holy, Holy, 

Three in One ! 



MY FIELD. 

WILL not wrong thee, To-day, 
With idle longing for To-morrow ; 
But patient plough my field and sow 
The seed of faith in every furrow. 

Enough for me the loving light 

That melts the cloud's repellent edges ; 

The still unfolding, bud by bud, 

Of God's most sweet and holy pledges. 

I breathe His breath ; my life is His ; 

The hand He nerves knows no defrauding; 
The Lord will make this joyless waste 

Wave with the wheat of His rewarding. 

Of His rewarding ! Yes ; and yet 
Not mine a single blade or kernel ; 

The seed is His ; the quickening His ; 
The care unchanging and eternal. 

His, too, the harvest song shall be 

When He who blessed the barren furrow 

Shall thrust His shining sickle in 
And reap my little field To-morrow. 
52 



APPEEHENSION. 

T^EAR Lord, this day is so unlike 
■*-^ The day I feared that it would be ! 
I wonder much, I said last night, 
What it will bring to me. 

What does it mean, — this haunting dread ? 

What added sorrows wait me more, 
And o'er my trembling spirit spread 

Their shadows thus before ? 

I seemed to stand upon a brink, 
Yet could not see the gulf below ; 

It dizzied me to try to think, 
As with some coming blow. 

Dear hands I saw on either side 

Reach out as for a final kiss ; 
And clasping each o'er each I cried, 

Not this one. Lord ; not this ! 

I cannot bear one parting more ; 

My heart is at the point to break ! 
As if Thou didst not know before, 

Dear Lord, to Thee I spake. 

53 



APPR EHENSION. 

And then I slept, the sleep of fear, 
And waked in sad bewilderment ; 

The day, the dreaded day, was here ; 
What trial would be sent ? 

Up to the zenith rose the sun, 

And now I watch its bright decline ; 

The hours have passed me one by one ; 
No added griefs are mine ! 

Still must I feel the piercing sword 
Of what hath been or yet may be ; 

But from that nameless terror. Lord, 
At least I am set free. 

And slowly, slowly, yet how sure, 
Returns the restful consciousness 

That in Thy care I am secure, 
And chastening, Thou dost bless. 

Not more than I can bear I know 
Thou, dearest Lord, on me wilt lay, 

And I can learn of Thee to go 
Unfearing on my way. 



"GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY 
BREAD." 

/^NE longing fills my heart that else 
^-^ With earthly cravings would overflow ; 
One pure desire within me dwells 

Amid desires I would forego ; 
One longing deep that day by day 
Sweeps every lesser wish away. 

It is not that I choose no more 
Between the shadow and the sun ; 

That vanities no longer lure ; 

That sweet and bitter are as one 5 

But that this longing day by day 

Sweeps every lesser wish away. 

If now I triumph, now I fail, 
Or now attain an inward peace, 

If now temptations sore assail, 

All things this longing but increase ; 

And oh! this longing day by day 

All gains, all losses doth outweigh. 

65 



56 "GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY BREAD:' 

It is for Thee, for Thee alone, 

Who art beyond all language dear; 

In life, in death, Thou only One 

Who stoopest low, who drawest near ; 

For Thee I hunger day by day, 

And pray the more the more I pray. 

Come, Daily Bread of gracious taste ; 

Sweet Manna endlessly supplied ; 
Thou hidden Joy that cannot waste ; 

Our Wayside Strength, however tried ; 
Come, Blessed Jesus, day by day, 
Lest we should faint beside the way ! 

Come, God and Saviour, to Thine own ; 

Kevealed to Faith's anointed eyes, 
Make Thou Thy very Presence known 

Though veiled in holy mysteries ; 
And oh ! — the sum of all I pray — 
Sweep Thou at last the veil away ! 



THE WAY OF THOENS. 

'T^HERE is but one true way ; 
Ko other choice be mine ; 
Lord, every path must lead astray 
Save only Thine. 

A straight and narrow road 
Hedged in with thorns indeed, 

And every thorn most like a goad 
To bid me heed. 

They wound my human pride, 
They rend my selfishness. 

And when I seek to turn aside, 
How sharp they press ! 

On every hand I hear 

Alluring tongues of time, 

And oft they win my outward ear 
Like silver chime. 

Tliey call : " That way forsake ; 

A needless strife is thine ; 

A thousand paths our feet may take 

And find divine." 

57 



58 THE WAY OF THORNS. 

But have ye seen tlie end ? 

I trembling answer back : 
He knoweth all, my Lord and Friend, 

Who points this track. 

Here His Apostles trod ; 

Here martyrs won their crown ; 
Here every saint for love of God 

The world laid down. 

His own most blessed feet 
This narrow pathway wore, 

And pangs no anguish can repeat 
For us He bore. 

All sorrow, shame, and scorn. 
Death, very death He knew ; 

From every thorn a sharper thorn 
His pity drew. 

A way of strife indeed. 

But every step I go 
That pity to repentance leads 

And keeps me low. 

Because the way is His, 

And victory is sure. 
And faith is more than present bliss, 

I can endure. 



o 



THE MONK OF LA TEAPPE. 

H what abounding grace ! 



Of one we read 
Whose piteous wound in lieu of speech did bleed 
(As if even Nature's self for him would plead) j 
Who mid his silent brethren silent went 
Two weary years on prayer and labor bent, 
Unmindful of his misery so he still 
Shaped every deed and thought to God's dear will; 
Nor heeded he his bed of knotted straw 
Whose vigils sore the Master only saw ; 
Nor looked forward to the ashen heap 
Whereon the dying brethren fell on sleep 
(Acquainting them or ere they joined the dead 
With the poor kindred dust whereto they sped) ; 
Nor fastings long, nor penance he relaxed ; 
Nor less the body for the body taxed ; 
Nor changed a whit the posture, or the face 
That shone with calm while grew his woe apace. 
Vain, vain the body's strife to turn aside 
The purpose of the spirit sanctified ! 
In snatch of wretched sleep his chastened will 

59 



60 THE MONK OF LA TRAPPE. 

Eestrained the groan, overcame the anguish, still ; 
And if perchance that sleep his lips unsealed, 
Their words of peace his sharpest pangs concealed. 

But when the oozing blood for him complained, 
And haK-betrayed his woe the raiment stained. 
The quick-eyed abbot bade the surgeon speed 
Whose skilful hand might serve his piteous need. 
Compassionate the sufferer they bound, 
"While wept the mute attendants standing round 
As the bared back disclosed the blackening wound. 
"Thus bind him fast !" the surgeon whispered low ; 
*'Not else might he endure the mortal woe ! " 
While they through tears beheld the fearful sight 
The poor monk raised a face of saintly light ; 
" Not of myself," he said, " but God is here 
To hold me that I neither shrink nor fear." 
Then even as Death's own shadow in the cell 
On him, on all, the wonted silence fell ; 
Only a dripping on the floor of brick 
As the sharp knife swift pierced to the quick : 
No shudder felt, no moan repressed, betrayed 
The spirit fainting or the flesh afraid. 
" O holy father, he must speak or die ! 
Command these lips to utter forth their cry ! " 
Implored the surgeon, with a whitening cheek. 
" Speak, my brother, speak ! I hid thee speak ! " 
With streaming eyes the pitying abbot said, 
As it were his own quivering flesh that bled ! 



THE MONK OF LA TRAPPE. 61 

The ashen lips almost a smile entranced, 
And from the eye unearthly rapture glanced, 
As his uplifted face like Stephen's glowed, 
And from his tongue a heavenly utterance flowed : 

"My Lord! my Lord! that Thou shouldst raise 

me up. 
And suffer me to taste Thy measureless cup 
Of agony, and in some poor degree 
Learn how all-measureless Thy Love must be ! 
O wondrous riches by the poorest gained ! 
heights no rapture ever yet attained ! 
O depths beyond all human thought to reach ! 
Love passing knowledge as it passeth speech ! 
That I should see the glory of Thy Face 
While yet vile clay in this despised place ! 
O all-transcending Love ! matchless grace ! 
Thrice-blest this tongue that may forego its spell 
Not of these pangs but of that Love to tell ! " 

Even as he spake back in their arms he fell. 
And Death's own radiance filled the narrow cell ! 



HIS PEACE. 

WHEN day and its cares are over 
I draw my chamber blind, 
And under tbe night's sweet cover 
All manner of comfort find. 

Like doves to their windows flying 
My thoughts from their daily quest 

At the call of my heart replying 
Beturn to their nightly rest. 

And folding them all together 
I hide them away from sight, 

Their wanderings hither and thither 
Eorgot in the quiet of night. 

One, only one thought remaineth ; 

It is born not of nature but grace, 
And upward the flight it taketh 

Beyond the limits of space : 

He only who changes never, 

Can choose for my soul the best ; 

Can quicken and crown the endeavor, 
He only can give me rest. 
62 



HIS PEACE. 63 

How migtity He is, I remember ; 

How measureless is His Love ; 
And how in the heart's hushed chamber 

His Peace may abide as a dove. 



THE BEIDE OF CHEIST. 

T3E patient; bid His time who will not tarry; 
■*-^ A thousand years He measures as a day ; 
All human plans, since human, may miscarry ; 
His never ! Keep His counsel j watch and 
pray. 
"Put up thy sword," He saith, 
" Be faithful unto death." 

Still keep with Him the vigil ever lonely, 

And wait on Him, for this is fullest praj^er. 
Though thine may be no conscious service, only 
Abide in Him and so His victory share. 
The work by Him begun, 
Shall it be left undone ? 

Since the first saints embraced His Cross and 
dying 
!N"o earthly triumph saw, yet were content, 
On His dear Presence, though unseen, relying 
His Holy Church has walked the way He 
went; 
Afflicted, destitute. 
And sore from head to foot. 

64 



THE BRIDE OF CHRIST, 65 

Betrayed by those in her dear bosom nourished, 

Assailed by heresies and often sold, 
Her head discrowned while many scoffers flour- 
ished, 
And yet her foes so ready to enfold — 
Pardon her message still 
For all repented ill ! 

As one whose place is at her footstool lowly 

Fed by her hand and by her comforted, 
Hear her entreat thee to obedience holy. 

Bidding thee watch and pray, as He hath said, 
While she through suffering 
Is fashioned like her King. 

Thou yet shalt see her, all her trials ended, 

Eobed as in garments woven white of flame, 
When He by thousand thousand saints attended, 
Their lifted foreheads burning with His Name, 
Shall come to claim the rest 
Who wait His Advent blest. 

She will be glorious ; neither spot nor wrinkle 

To mar the beauty of her holiness ; 
And all the nations that His blood shall sprinkle 
The Bride and Bridegroom shall alike confess j 
Forever One the Twain, 
Forever more their Eeign ! 



66^ THE BRIDE OF CHRIST. 

Oh, worth, the travail of a life expended 

By all her countless children multiplied, 
When we shall see in her all sorrows ended 
And love and joy and peace on every side; 
All lives complete in One ; 
His Will forever done ! 



I 



"IT IS I." 

T is so hard ! " I said, 



'■J 



And sat within and told my troubles o'er ; 
A hand fell softly on my bowed head, 
Yet no one passed my door. 

" A fancy ! " then I said ; 
"But oh ! to feel that touch forevermore ! 

Methinks, indeed, I could be comforted ! '' 
And sorrowed as before. 

" No other heart can know ! " 
Brake out my grief again with bitter cry ; 

" And God is far — so far my faith lets go 
Her hold on Heaven to die ! " 

Then some one stooped low. 

His heart full-throbbing, as with tears, close by ; 

" Lord ! is it Thou so moved by my woe ? " 

He answered, " It is I." 

67 



WHEN I AWAKE. 

Ps. xvii. 15. 

WHEI:^ I awake shall I Thine image hear, 
O Thou Adored ? 
The image lost, in some pure Otherwhere 

Oh, shall it he restored ? 
Already stealeth o'er my tremhling soul 

Some semblance sweet, — '' 

The wavering outline of the perfect whole 
Thy Touch shall yet complete ? 

When I awake shall I indeed cast by 

All earthly taint, 
And walk with Thee in white, Thy white, on high, 

As seraph walks and saint ? 
Through endless, blessed ages shall I know 

Thy Will alone; 
Its all-pervading, perfect motions grow 

More than mine own mine own ? 

The glories that no vision can forestall 

With crystal gleam ; 
The peace, the rapture, and the holy thrall 

Of Love that reigns supreme ; 

68 



WHEN I AWAKE, 69 

The death of all that meaneth self and time ; 

The gain of Thee, 
My Lord, my God ! the victory sublime 

When only Thou shalt be, — 

Thou, all in all, — all in Thy fulness lost, 

And all, all found 
Dear beyond price, no aspiration crossed j 

Thou, only Thou our bound ; — 
Shall I behold, receive, possess, attain 

All this and more 
To tell whereof all tongues would strive in vain, 

In vain all language pour ? 

Shall the Great Vision that transcends our dreams 

At last unfold ? 
Thy Eace, Thy Glory whence all glory streams 

Shall I indeed behold 
When I awake ? Oh can it ever be, 

All joys beside. 
That I shall gaze and gaze, my God, on Thee ? 

I shall be satisfied. 



ANXIETY. 

Tj^AINT hearts, wlio toil and pray, but doubt 
•*■ If God will grant ! 

Theirs is the harvest who in trust 

Do sow and plant, 
Nor ponder whether it will be 

Or full or scant. 

If once it fail, with diligence 

They sow again; 
Another year will surely bring 

The needed rain. 
The needed sun, to fill the fields 

With fuller grain ! 

The Lord of love may hear as though 

He heard us not. 
But never yet the prayer of faith 

Hath He forgot ; 
Some day His word will fruitful make 

Each waiting spot. 

"We rise betimes, as if our zeal 

That word could speed ; 
We eat the bread of carefulness, 
70 



ANXIETY. 71 

That cannot feed ; 

Delaying rest, we only add 

Sore need to need. 

Oh, happy they who quietly 

Anticipate 
The blessing He will shower down, 

Or soon or late ! 
They toil, they pray, aright ; their faith 

His will can wait. 



THE PEEEECT EEIEND. 

/^NE only friend we have 
^^ Accounted sure ; 
One only love is ours 
That will endure. 

All other friends are dear ; 

He knows how dear 
Who gave them for our joy 

And solace here. 

All other loves are sweet ; 

He knows how sweet 
Of whom sad souls that lack 

For love entreat. 

But friends however true 

This life will test, 
And they will fail us oft 

Who know us best. 

And love however strong 

In time may change ; 
Misfortunes may divide, 

New ties estrange. 

72 



THE PERFECT FRIEND. 73 

Sorest of all will come 

Some sad offence ; 
Mistrust will chill, and doubt 

Drive friendship hence. 

slow of heart to learn 

What yet we own — 
One only perfect friend 

Hath any known. 



«< COULD I BUT HAVE THEE BACK 
AGAIN." 

f~^ OULD I but have thee back again, 
^-^ Through days and years to nurse and tend, 
How blessed would it be for me 
Those days and years to spend ! 

What skill of love and tenderness 

These hands, unneeded now, would learn ; 

How precious would the burden be 
Of care for which I yearn ! 

Almost for thee these feet would fly, 

Whose steps have laggard grown of late ; 

Thy hidden wish my heart would know 
And swift anticipate. 

How would my hardships be forgot ; 

How joy my joys would multiply, 
And make an Eden of the spot 

Where thou didst live and die ! 

But 0, dear heart, the wish forgive ! 

Eorgive, dear Lord, the thought profane 
That would a soul at rest recall 

For such a selfish gain ! 

74 



''COULD I BUT HAVE THEE BACK AGAIN." 75 

Forgive the will unsanctified 

That crossing Thine my lot would shape, 
And from affliction's discipline 

Ordained, for me escape ! 

O, not that presence, sweet and dear 
Beyond all language, should I crave, 

But rather grace my loss to bear 
And lonely hours to brave. 

Remind me ever, Lord, how brief 
The partings of this life will be ; 

How close and closer grow the bonds 
Of those who live in Thee. 

Or here or there in Paradise 

The fold is one, since it is Thine ; 

And grief removes its boundary 
When faith forgets the line. 



"HIM THAT COMETH TO ME I WILL 
IN NO WISE CAST OUT." 



TTEEE, weary heart, at last tliy wanderings 
•^ -■- cease ; 

Thy long, sad quest ; 
Nowhere beside is hope ; nowhere is peace ; 

Nowhere is rest. 



O slow to come to Him who called and called 

With proffers sweet ! 
While pride withheld thee and thy sin appalled 

He did entreat. 

What is thy shame, however great thy shame, " 

When thou dost think 
That knowing all He loved thee all the same ; 

How couldst thou shrink! 

How couldst thou fear ! as if He could reject 

Who came to save ! 
To give thee spite of guilt and long neglect 

What thou didst crave — 
-.76 



''HIM THAT COMETH TO ME.'' 77 

The sense of pardon filling all the soul 

Washed clean at last ; 
The grace that follows with its sweet control ; 

The shame o'erpast ! 

To win thee sorrowing to His glad embrace 

How hath He striven ! 
Oh, hear His Voice — couldst thou but see His 
Pace ! — 

Thou art forgiven ! 



IN THE GAEDEN. 

T N this still garden in the cool of day 

I often meditate : — 
Should He who walked in Eden come this way 

And consecrate 
This place of bloom with Presence passing fair 
And robes that make more sweet this summer air ! 

Anon a Voice far off yet near I catch, 

And question, — Comes He now ? 

The virgin lilies that for Him keep watch 
Do lowly bow, 

And the meek grasses lowlier yet to greet 

His soft approach and reverent kiss His feet. 

But as for me who cannot see Him pass 
Yet fain would feel Him near, 
I bow me lowlier even than the grass, 

In love and fear ; 
Far lowlier than the lilies on their stem, 
And through them press to touch His garment's 
hem ! 

78 



IN THE GARDEN. 79 

More softly blows the summer wind to lift 

His mantle's sacred fold ; 
Through all the place sweet sighs and odors drift 

Like bliss half-told ; 
And in the fading west a single star 
Trembles with rapture watching Him afar ! 

And oh, that I should see that star remote 

Yet His near Glory miss 
Wherein the sun itself and stars do float 

As motes, I wis ! 
But since no man that Glory could abide, 
How should I dare lament the sight denied ! 

Dark, hushed and dark, the garden round me 
grows. 

The folded flowers more sweet ; 
I hearken long to hear Him where He goes 

With noiseless feet, 
Till the familiar place seems sad and strange, 
And Eden to Gethsemane doth change. 

Through heavy silence falls the heavy dew 
Like sweat of sorrow wrung, 

As if the bitter cup were filled anew 
O'er which He hung. 

Whose Love all love transcending overcame, 

For us endured the Cross, despised the shame I 



80 IN THE GARDEN. 

Albeit against that Presence passing by 
These mortal eyes are sealed, 

I see this Other, like Him, standing nigh. 
To faith revealed : 

At His dear feet on consecrated sod 

I cry like one of old ; " My Lord — my God ! ^^ 



THE TWO CITIES. 

/^N the dusky shores of evening stretched in 
^-^ shining peace it lies, 

City built of clouds and sunshine, wonder of 
the western skies ! 

While I watch and long for pinions thitherward 

to take my flight, 
Slowly the aerial City fades and vanishes from 

sight. 

Euby dome and silver temple, circling wall of 

amethyst, 
Fall in silence leaving only purple ruin hung with 

mist. 

Darkness gathers eastward, westward; stronger 

waxeth my desire 
Reaching through celestial spaces glittering as 

with rain of fire, 

To the City set in jasper having twelve founda- 
tions fair, 

Flashing from their jewelled splendor every color 
soft and rare. 

81 



82 THE TWO CITIES. 

Twelve in number are its gateways, numbered 

by the Seer of old ; 
Every gate a pearl most lustrous, and its streets 

are paved with gold. 

In the midst in dazzling whiteness lightens the 

Eternal Throne ; 
From it flows the Living water ; round it gleams 

an emerald zone. 

Luscious fruits and balmy odors, healing leaves 

and cooling shade, 
Either side the Life-tree sheddeth by sweet storms 

of music swayed. 

O thou grand untempled City seen by John iu 

visions bright, 
Glory-flooded, needing neither sun by day nor 

moon by night j 

Eilled forever and forever by the shining light of 

Him 
Who redeemed the world and sitteth throned 

between the Seraphim ! 

Through thy lovely gates the nations of the saved 

in triumph stream. 
Chanting praise above all praises, love of love 

their holy theme. 



THE TWO CITIES. 83 

They no more shall thirst or hunger, they no 

more with heat shall faint ; 
Christ for tears will give them gladness, blissful 

rest for sore complaint. 

Blessed they who do His bidding, cries the Angel 

day and night ; 
They shall find abundant entrance ; they shall 

walk with Him in white. 



"NO ONE TAKETH YOUR PEACE 
AWAY." 



'T^HE long week's close : how sweet and clear 
•^ The curfew greets the tired world's ear ! 
*' In sleep by night and in rest by day, 
Peace be yours ! " it seems to say. 



Then folds the world its countless hands ; 
Unheeded slide the drowsy sands, 
This last sweet night of the rounded seven 
Falling noiselessly out of heaven. 

In depths of more celestial blue 
The sacred morn unfolds anew, 
As if to yield to the weary breast 
Balm of beauty as well as rest. 

How hushed ! the silence-quickened ear 
Turned heavenward can almost hear 
The white cloud trail, and the arrow of light 
Earthward speeding in golden flight. 
84 



"NO ONE TAKETH YOUR PEACE AWAY:' 85 

And over all. compassionate, 
A tender Presence seems to wait, 
Beyond the cloud, beyond the light, 
Beckoning upward from height to height. 

" In sleep by night and in rest by day, 
May peace be yours," did the curfew say ? 
" I, only, can give you peace ! " replies 
A Voice that thrilleth the boundless skies. 

Lord Jesus, turn us from the noise 
Of endless strivings and empty joys, 
To find forever Thy one true peace. 
Best from sorrow, from sin release ! 

Then will each morn of the week-day year 
The Lord's Day morning mirror clear; 
And every night will the curfew say, 
" No one taketh your peace away." 



THE WANING YEAR 

n^HE year is waning, waning ; 
-^ I feel its close draw near ; 
A murmur of complaining 

In all earth's sounds I hear, 
That saith, The year is waning ; 

And sighs, O waning year ! 

All garnered is its glory, 
Its fulness and its might ; 

The ghostly fields lie hoary 
Seen in the early light ; 

The threads of summer's story 
Are lost to touch and sight. 

But memories grow dearer 
When falls the latest leaf ; 

And many things grow clearer 
To eyes made dim by grief ; 

And hidden things seem nearer 
Because the days are brief. 
86 



THE WANING YEAR. S7 

The wealth we must surrender 
Of leafage, bloom, and light, 

Keveals the larger splendor 
And grandeur of the night ; 

And worship that we render 
Seems more in God's own sight. 



The heavens laid bare above us 

In majesty untold, 
Show forth how He doth love us, 

And would our lives infold ; 
How the dear Lord would have us 

Look up to Him more bold ; 

With simple, childlike boldness, 
That fears without a fear ; 

Kor stands far off in coldness, 
But draws unquestioning near ; 

A glad, forgetful boldness. 
That saith. Thy child is here ! 

Oh, as the years go by us, 
As year by year they wane. 

And many 'trials try us. 
And everything is vain, 

If God doth not deny us 

How can our hearts complain \ 



83 THE WANING YEAR. 

The fields will fade around us, 

Our beauty go away ; 
The darkness will surround us, 

But, oh ! we need not stray ; 
And nothing shall confound us 

Who look to Him alway. 

The year is waning, waning ; 

I feel its close draw near ; 
And through the earth's complaining 

One blessed Voice I hear. 
happy, peaceful waning ! 

How sweet the waning year ! 



VALE. 



r^ OOD-NIGHT, Earth ! the nights are grow- 
^^ ing long ; 

The days are brief ; 
Life hath one solemn burden for its song : 

" As fades the leaf." 



Good-night, poor World ! if thou art full of sin 

Why so am I ! 
In this proud heart to judge would I begin, 

Nor self pass by. 

Good-night, my foe ! not all the wrong was thine j 

My share I own ; 
Forgive ! — we, human, know one word Divine ; 

The sun goes down. 

Good-night, good friend ! though poor my gifts to 
thee 

I will not fret ; 
The richer thou whose bounty is so free, 

And sweet my debt. 

89 



90 V^l^^- 

No longer to revenge nor to repay 

I strive or seek ; 
Empty I came, must empty go away, — 

Empty and weak. 

As one wlio wakes no more to smile or weep 

Another day, 
So would I lay me humbly down to sleep 

And humbly say : 

Dear Lord, who hadst not where to lay Thy head, 

As poor were I 
Did not Thy mercy make for me a bed 

Whereon to die. 



OCCASIOITAL. 

FEASTS AND FASTS OF THE CHURCH, 
ETC. 



THE NATIVITY. 

T3ENEATH the dark expectant skies, while 

•^-^^ crowded Bethlehem slept, 

Their sleeping flocks in quiet fields the faithful 

shepherds kept, 
When round about them, suddenly, there shone a 

glorious light, 
And in the midst an Angel stood, majestical and 

bright. 

"What mortal eye could look undazed ! what mortal 

ear could hear 
The voice most sweet, most terrible in sweetness, 

without fear ! 
While on the wide Judean hills the reverent winds 

were stayed, 
Prostrate the humble shepherds fell, for they were 

sore afraid. 

" Eear not ; behold, I bring you joy ! " the Angel 

spake and smiled ; 
"To you this day in David's town is born the 

promised Child j 

93 



94 THE NATIVITY. 

A Saviour, even Christ the Lord, and this shall be 

the sign — 
Ye in a manger lowly laid shall find the Babe 

Divine.'' 



And with the Angel, lo ! a host of shining ones 

was seen, 
Chanting, "All glory be to God, as it hath ever ' 

been ; 
Glory to God, on earth be peace, and unto men 

good-will," 
They sang, in splendor vanishing, and all grew 

dark and still. 



Amazed the shepherds heard, and rose and made 

with haste their way 
To where, within the stable walls, the world's 

Redeemer lay ; 
Nor wider space nor fairer place had earth to 

spare for Him 
Whose Throne from everlasting burned, rayed 

round with seraphim. 

While softly raining out of heaven, in silver 
cadences 

Plowed down those sweet angelic strains pro- 
claiming joy and peace ; 



THE NATIVITY. 95 

Her rapture swelling into tears, the trembling 

Mother bent 
Above her Child, her Holy One, in awe and won 

derment. 



And if a cloud of radiance filled the consecrated 

place, 
That cloud was darkness in her eyes, long-dwelling 

on His face j 
Her tranced vision scarce withdrawn when the 

glad shepherds came, 
Beheld the Babe and glorified the One Eternal 

Name. 



And was the Word, indeed, made flesh ? O Ever- 
lasting Lord ! 

Prince of Peace ! Mighty God, forevermore 
adored ! 

"Who reckoning unreckoned bliss cast all His 
glory by 

When from the prison-house of sin He heard the 
captive cry ! 

Love, that no created love can ever compre- 
hend, 

Outreaching life's dark uttermost, bounding the 
endless end j 



96 TEE NATIVITY, 

That condescended to the low from Height above 

all height, 
And bosomed in a blameless Babe brought into 

darkness light ! 



Wherever Christmas bells shall chime and Christ- 
mas cheer go round, 

Be grateful joy — not heedless mirth — in every 
dwelling found ; 

While Faith unveils her throbbing breast and 
closelier folds within 

The Holy Child whose sinlessness hath answered 
once for sin. 



The humblest home that He may find, the poorest 

heart of earth, 
Not meaner is than Bethlehem's stall made fair 

by Jesus' birth ; 
And light more marvellous shall stream into that 

house of clay. 
Abiding and abounding more unto the perfect 

day. 



Comfort to answer all desire and soothe the 

sharpest pain, 
A rest to weariness, and ease to such as do 

complain. 



THE NATIVITY, 97 

Bread to the hungry, and to them that thirst a 

living well, 
The Saviour with His neediest ones doth most 

delight to dwell. 



He honoreth not the place of pride, but seeketh 

lowly doors, 
And love, the sweet return of love, is all that He 

implores ; 
The love that waiting on His word doth evermore 

increase, 
And magnify in daily life the angels' song of 

peace. 

Wherever Christmas greetings flow and Christmas 

cheer goes round, 
Let charity in gracious deeds and gracious thoughts 

abound ; 
And Zion, garlanding her gates, put on her glad 

array. 
And celebrate with psalms of joy Emmanuel's natal 

day. 

O Christ, Most High ! Incarnate God ! Meek Babe 

of Bethlehem ! 
To whom all angels cry aloud. Thy glory shadowing 

them. 



98 THE NATIVITY. 

Hear, througli the praise of heaven, the praise of 

Thy redeemed earth 
"Whose desert places yet shall sing for joy of 

Jesus' birth ! 



"THE SWEETEST HYMN THAT EVER 
WAS SUNO." 

' I ""HE sweetest hymn that ever was sung 
-*- Was the Hymn of the Christ-Child's birth, 
When that night of nights over Bethlehem hung, 

And angels came thronging to earth 

To herald the Christ-Child's birth. 

The brightest star that ever was seen 
Was the Star that led the way 

Eor the wise old kings to the cradle mean 
Where the Child Emmanuel lay, — 
The Star that showed them the way. 

Still sweetly echoes that sweetest Hymn 

Once sung in the ages afar, 
And over the wide earth altars gleam 

Enkindled by Bethlehem's Star 

That led the sages from far. 

And the Christ who came of old to His own 

As truly comes to them now, 
Where the faithful before His altar-throne 

With hearts believing bow, — 

Emmanuel^ then and now. 

99 



100 THE SWEETEST HYMN. 

O Son of Mary ! Love Divine ! 

Whom the old kings hailed as King, 
All praise be Thine, and the fairest shrine. 

And the costliest gifts we can bring 

To Thee, Eternity's King ! 

The tribute-gold, as it was of old, 
Poured out, dear Lord, at Thy feet, 

And the incense of worship that will not grow cold, 
And the myrrh of penitence meet, 
All cast with ourselves at Thy feet ! 



MAEY MOTHER. 

TV yTOEE than royal Guest He lay 
IVX "W^here the gentle kine made way 
For the Christ-Child meek as they. 

Knelt the Magi round His bed, 
Bowed low each proudest head j 
Mary Mother pondered. 

Gold and frankincense and myrrh 
They the wise and great confer j 
Jesus mild looks up to her ! 

What her gift ? Than nothing less ! 
Oh that she might crown and bless 
Him whom kings shall King confess ! 

Pierced as with woes to come 
At His feet her soul lies dumb, 
Love, of all she hath, the sum I 

Blessed among women, thou 
Who, exalted most, dost bow 
Lowliest among the low ! 

101 



"THIS IS THE TEUE GOD." 
1 St. John v. 20. 

BEHOLD the Virgin bears 
The Promised Child ! 
Lulled on her bosom undefiled, 
The Wonderful, the Counsellor 
Whom age on age hath waited for, 
The Mighty God, the Father, shares 
With us Humanity ! 
For love of us stoops down 
To our subjection ; 
Becomes Emmanuel 
That we 

Eegenerate in Him may dwell, 
And share the crown 
Of His Divinity 
In resurrection ! 

Behold Him, then, 

Children of men ! 

Only a little Babe ye see 

On Mary's knee ; 

But this is He — 

I AM from all eternity ! 

102 



''THIS IS THE TRUE GOD:' 103 

Around Him angels bend 

But cannot comprehend — 

And how can we ! — 

The Incarnation's mystery ; 

The Love that could not be expressed, 

In Flesh, our Elesh, made manifest. 



"ENDED THE VIGIL OF AGES." 

"Tj^NDED the vigil of ages, 
-'— ' Ended the Prophets' line ; 
Eorth from the womh of the Virgin 
Cometh the Babe Divine. 

Out of the highest Heaven 
Down to the wondering earth 

Choirs of angels descending 
Carol the Christ-Child's birth. 

One with the Eather Eternal 

Human the Name that He bears ; 

Godhead and Manhood united 

Veiled in the Flesh that He wears. 

This is the King Immortal 
Nation by nation shall seek ; 

Never a child so majestic, 
Never a prince so meek. 

Clad in Humility's vesture, 
Peace as His sceptre of might, 

Monarchs approaching His presence 
Prostrate shall fall at the sight. 

104 



ENDED THE VIGIL OF AGES, 105 

Innocence wears He as ermine, 

Poverty maketh His crown, 
Love is the throne of His glory, 

Mercy His matchless renown. 

Homeless and laid in a manger, 

Seeming earth's pity to crave, 
Kuleth He still creation, 

Helpless, is mighty to save. 

Blessed henceforth are the lowly 

Who of His lowliness learn ; 
Blessed who showeth His mercy, 

Keaping His mercy in turn. 

Blessed henceforth who forsaketh 
Kindred and lands for His sake. 

Counting no burden too grievous 
Jesus may call him to take. 

Even a cup of cold water 

Unto His little ones given 
He shall return to the giver 

Filled from the fountains of Heaven. 

Blessed the least in His Kingdom 
More than the Prophets of old 

Who in the Babe of the manger 
Saviour, Jehovah behold. 



106 ENDED THE VIGIL OF AGES, 

Pall at His feet, ye faithful, 
Worship the King of Kings ! 

Angels unnumbered adore Him 
Folding around you their wings. 

Sweeter and sweeter their carols 
Swelling with rapture arise ; 

Join in the joyful hosannas 

Circling the earth and the skies ! 



CHEISTMAS CAEOL. 

O HAPPY earth, whose darkest night 
The angels flood with song and light ! 
O happy shepherds, first to hear 
The tidings meant for every ear ! 
O happy night, happy morn, 
A Saviour, Christ the Lord is born ! 

O happy heaven, among whose spheres 

The Christ-Child's blazing star appears ! 

O happy Magi, from afar 

Led by the Christ-Child's blazing star ! 
O Bethlehem ! spot most fair, 
Por Mary and the Child are there ! 

O Maiden-mother, Virgin blest, 
Clasping the young Child to thy breast, 
The wondering shepherds may adore, 
The Eastern kings their treasures pour, 
But in thy heart the Babe Divine 
Hath fashioned for Himself a shrine. 

O happy souls that throng on throng 
Make fair the ages all along, 

107 



108 CHRISTMAS CAROL. 

In glad succession hail the star, 
And catch and spread the tidings far, 
And carol still each Christmas morn, 
A Saviour, Christ the Lord is born ! 

Awake, awake, sluggard heart ! 

O foes, be friends, forget your smart ! 

O cold hearth, glow ; laugh, lonely place ! 

O'erflow, earth, with every grace ; 
Sing, sing again this blessed morn, 
A Saviour, Christ the Lord is born ! 



"THEEE WAS NO ROOM FOR THEM IN 

THE INN." 

HTHOU, the Eternal Son 
■^ Though of Thy glory shorn ; 
Thou, very God of very God 
Though Man of Mary born ; — 

Is there no room for Thee 

Even in Bethlehem's inn ? 
Dost Thou who comest to Thine own 

Erom them no welcome win ? 

Dost Thou the bitter Cross 

So eagerly embrace 
For us, and we for thee prepare 

No poorest dwelling-place ? 

No room for Thee ? No room 

Eor love and sacrifice 
Such as no mortal could conceive 

And none but Thou devise ? 

sweetest Jesus, hear ! 
Though I am poor indeed, 

1 know I can provide a spot 
To meet Thy lowly need. 

109 



110 " NO ROOM FOR THEM IN THE INN.'* 

\ 

Such, love as Thine must crave, 

Above all other things, 
The love of those on whom 't is spent, 

And all that loving brings. 

For love is shelter, food, 
A bed of down, a throne ; 

Its very breath obedience 
To him whom it doth own. 

Come, sweetest Jesus, then, 

In this poor heart abide ; 
And I shall love Thee more and more 

Till love is satisfied. 



HYMN FOR GOOD FRIDAY. 



/^H ! see Him where He hangs, 
^^ The world's one sacrifice ; 
No tongue of earth can tell His pangs, 
Who our Redeemer dies. 

True God and truest Man, 

In one forever knit j 
His anguish thought can never span, 

For it is infinite. 

In all the universe 

The central Figure He, 
As weeping centuries rehearse 

Time's crowning tragedy. 

Again the flood of scorn. 

The scourge, the crown, the jeer, 
The sacred body nailed and torn. 

The taunts, the sponge, the spear. 

Again — depth, height 
Of Love that hath no name ! — 

The prayer for those who in His sight 
Could no compassion claim. 

Ill 



112 HYMN FOR GOOD FRIDAY. 

Again the rended rocks, 
The hearts of human stone, 

The darkness and the earthquake shocks, 
The graves of hope upthrown. 

At His dear feet again, 

His Cross in her embrace, 
The weeping Church, like Magdalen, 

Buries her stricken face. 

Again the streaming side. 

The broken heart, the cry ! 
Again, Jesus Crucified, 

The endless victory. 



A MEDITATION. 

r\ MYSTERY beyond the reach 
^^ Of all created thought or speech ! — 
Concealed as man from human eyes 
Our God became our sacrifice. 

One life, decreed all lives to lift 
In union with its wondrous gift, 
Constrained eternal love to show 
By bearing all their weight of woe. 

Sinless, as Chief Transgressor He 
Poured out His blood upon the tree, 
While penitence and unbelief 
Keaped His compassion and His grief ! 

For us, for us, true God, He bled 
From nail-torn hands and thorn-crowned head 
From spear-rent heart — the heart of God ! — 
From feet that Sorrow's wine-press trod. 

Poor souls, who thirst and hunger, see 
Your hope, your help, in Calvary ; 
Find here the crown of all your quest — 
God's boundless love made manifest ! 

113 



CALVAEY. 

"V T THAT does it mean, this wood 
^ ^ So stained with, blood ; 
This tree without a root 
That bears such fruit ; 
This tree without a leaf 
So leaved with grief! 

What does its height proclaim 
Whose height is Shame j 
Its piteous arms outspread 
Where death lies dead ; 
And in the midst a heart 
Cleft wide apart ! 

Though fool, I cannot miss 

Its meaning, this : 

My sin's stupendous price; 

His sacrifice; 

Where closest friendships end 

One Friend — my Friend. 

|114 



THE EESURRECTION. 

"VT'E who, clad in shining raiment, 
•*' Watch within the empty tomb 
Where the dear Lord's sacred Body- 
Lay in death through yester's gloom, 
Tell us, guests from realms of glory, 
All the E-esurrection's story ! 

How the tide of life returning 

Flushed the pierced hands and feet ; 

How the Heart so lately broken 
Once again began to beat ; 

How the Head by thorns so wounded 

Victory's aureole surrounded ! 

Tell us, glorious one whose garment 
Gleameth whiter than the snow, 

And whose countenance as lightning 
Laid the watch, like dead men, low; 

Mightiest one, from Heaven descended, 

Tell us how the tomb was rended ! 

115 



116 THE RESURRECTION. 

How the seal secure was broken 
Ere the dawning of the day ; 

How the solid earth was shaken 
When the stone was rolled away ; 

While the world unconscious slumbered 

And the hours of death were numbered. 



Tell — but oh, no tongue can utter 

What transcendeth speech and thought ! 

Passeth angels' comprehension 
How the miracle was wrought. 

He was dead ; and lo ! He liveth ; 

Yea, and Life Eternal giveth ! 



Forth He came ! the Human Body 
He for man the fallen wore, 

And the Human Soul united, 
Glorified f orevermore ; 

That in wondrous re-creation 

Man might share His exaltation. 

While He fasted in the desert, 
Tempted long and sorely tried, 

Prayed in anguish in the Garden, 
On the Cross in anguish died, 

Watching with her Lord and weeping,' 

Solemn fast the Church was keeping. 



TEE resurrection: 117 

Feast of Feasts the Fast succeedeth ! 

Once again the strain is poured : 
Alleluia ! Alleluia ! 

Glory to the risen Lord ! 
Song of songs, in endless gladness 
Drowning pain and doubt and sadness. 

Alleluia ! " He is risen ! " 

" Eisen indeed ! '' the shouts resound. 
Holy greeting answers greeting ; 

Joy at last on earth is found. 
Shore to shore the salutations 
Bind as one redeemed nations. 

Alleluia ! Choirs of angels 

To the choirs of earth respond ; 

Alleluia ! Alleluia ! 

Eolleth seas and skies beyond. 

Heaven and earth at last shall sever, 

But the song shall peal forever ! 



^'SING YE LOWLY, SING YE GEEAT." 

SING ye lowly, sing ye great, 
With the Easter joy elate ! 
Christ the Lord is risen indeed ; 
Crown of hope for every need ! 

Poverty and wealth akin 
In the piteous bond of sin, 
Eager youth and anxious age 
Bound on common pilgrimage ; 

One and all up-lif t the strain ; 
Christ our Saviour lives again ; 
Lives to set us free once more 5 
As we journey goes before. 

All the way He maketh bright, 
It was dark, but He is Light ; 
It was weary, He is Eest ; 
He our End as He our Quest. 

Wandering sinner, striving saint, 
Prisoner hopeless of complaint, 
Courage kindles now anew; 
Christ the Lord is risen for you. 

118 



**SING YE LOWLY, SING YE GREAT,'* 119 

Lift your head, poor penitent, 
Mercy is with judgment blent ; 
Christ is risen to bestow 
Just the peace you long to know, ' 

Mourner weeping at the tomb, 
See how ev'n the grave maj'- bloom ; ' 
Where He lay what hopes were sown! 
Make the harvest sweet your own. 

For us men a Man was He ; 
Never friend so close could be; 
For us, helpless, He overcame ; 
We may conquer in His Name. 

For us mortal He Divine, 
Makes the way immortal shine ; 
With the Comforter bestows 
Grace no life unquickened knows. 

Death His Flesh could not constrain; 
Lord of Life He rose again ; 
God of God and Light of Light, 
Sing His triumph, sing His might ! 



"SUN-DAY THAT FILLETH ALL 
SUNDAYS WITH LIGHT." 

TA AY of the crucified Lord's E-esurrection ; 
-■-^ Day that the Lord by His triumph hath 

made ; 
Day of the seal of Eedemption's perfection; 

Day of the crown of His power displayed; 
Beautiful Easter, dazzlingly bright ; 
Sun-Day that filleth all Sundays with light I 

Queen of all festivals ; glad culmination 
Of the bright feasts that encircle the year ; 

Glimpsing the Life, in a transfiguration. 
That shall at length in its glory appear ; 

Beautiful Easter ; day in its height ; 

Sun-Day that filleth all Sundays with light ! 

Banish the gloom in the house of the mourner 
Keeping the vigil that sorrow compels ; 

Melt the cold walls of that prison forlorner 
Where unbelief in its solitude dwells; 

Beautiful Easter, dazzlingly bright ; 

Sun-Day that filleth all Sundays with light I 
120 



" S UN-DAY." 121 

Pierce with thy rays those saddest of places, 
Hearts that are darkened by sin or despair ; 

Stream o'er the earth's most desert-like spaces 
Making them blossom than Eden more fair ; 

Beautiful Easter, dazzlingly bright; 

Sun-Day that fiUeth all Sundays with light ! 

Day of the hope that is almost fruition ; 

Day of Christ's message of "Peace " to His 
own; 
Day of the pledge that His creatures' condition. 

He will transform to a glory unknown ; 
Beautiful Easter, dazzlingly bright ; 
Sun-Day that filleth all Sundays with light ! 

He who redeemeth, consoleth, forgiveth ; 

Who His own body raised up from the dead ; 
Holdeth all evil in bondage and liveth. 

Source of all blessing, our Life and our Head. 
It is His Glory that maketh thee bright, 
Sun-Day that filleth all Sundays with light ! 



THE TEANSFIGUEATION. 

"pAIE mount where Jesus knelt and prayed, 
-■- What splendor crowned thy holy crest 
When to His followers He revealed 
The Godhead they by faith confessed ! 

Bright as the sun His face they saw, 

White as the light His garments gleamed ; 

Transfigured He transfigured all 

The place whereon His radiance streamed. 

With earth so far and heaven so near 
What wonder they were fain to stay, 

And Moses and Elias came 

By that great vision rapt as they ! 

What wonder, while with them He spake 
And overhead the cloud appeared 

And from its glory came the voice, 
That they who heard it greatly feared ! 

The glory waned, the saints of old 

Departed by the ways unknown. 
And looking up the prostrate three 

Beheld their blessed Lord alone. 

122 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 123 

Ko more that vision may return, 

The cloud appear, the voice be heard, 

But by that one transcendent scene 
The heart of faith is ever stirred. 

And though we see Thee not, Lord, 
Thy presence faithful souls perceive, 

And blessed they, as Thou hast said. 
Who have not seen and yet believe. 



MISSIONAEY PEOCESSIONAL. 

"Y 'XT IDEE- and wider yet 
^ ^ The gates of the nation swing ; 
Clearer and clearer still 

The wonderful prophecies ring ; 
Go forth, ye host of the Living God, 
And conquer the world for your King. 

" Go into all the world," 
For this is the charge Divine ; 

Eastward and westward go. 
Uplifting His conquering sign ; 

Go forth! the ends of the earth are His ; 
Press on with unfaltering line. 

Millions on millions wait 

The message ye have to bring ; 

Go, with the Word of God, 

Commissioned by Jesus your King; 

Go forth, the arrows of truth to speed, 
,The songs of deliverance sing. 

Open the eyes of the blind, 

And give to the heathen sight ; 
Show to the feet astray 

124 



MISSIONARY PROCESSIONAL. 125 

The path of the children of light ; 
Go forth, and gather the lost, and clothe 
The penitent sinner in white. 

Grant them the mystic birth ; 

The seal of the Holy Ghost; 
Give them the Living Bread, 

The food of God's militant host ; 
Go forth, bestowing these priceless gifts 

No bounty of monarch can boast. 

Heralds of Christ, go forth. 

And count not your lives as dear ; 

Haste, for the day draws on 
When He shall in glory appear. 

Go forth ! His promises cannot fail ; 
The conquest eternal is near. 

Wider and wider yet 

The gates of the nation swing ; 
Clearer and clearer still 

The wonderful prophecies ring; 
Go forth, ye host of the Living God, 

And conquer the world for your King ! 



SONNETS. 



TO JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. 

"D UT for thy gracious words, revered of men, 
•*-^ Scarce had I ventured on from year to 
year 

To seek the great world's much-engrossed ear 
With the small rhythmic whispers of my pen. 
And now to silence oft withdrawing when 

Thy songs so full and sweet, so strong and 
clear. 

And those of others, nobly sung, I hear, 
I ask, Why do I aught but listen ? Then 
Myself makes answer, Who hath given thee 

This voice within that thou art fain to still ? 
Though few and scarcely heard thy notes may be, 

Seek not, nor yet withhold. Trust makes 
amends 
For Trust that waits unquestioning G-od's will, 

Hearing His words above the words of friends. 

129 



"HE OPENED NOT HIS MOUTH." 

"P ACH counts his lot most grievous ; his distress 
"^-^ Sorer than other's ; each is prone to harp 
Upon his many trials (though he carp 
At his poor neighbor's fretting none the less) ; 
Tor all his wrongs there seemeth small redress ; 
"No other's ills were ever quite so sharp ; 
Misfortunes all his plans do thwart and warp ; 
No loss his loss can match ; no sorrows press 
Like his ! Ah ! eighteen hundred years ago 
The pangs and penalties of all mankind 
Through all the groaning centuries behind 
And all the wrestling centuries to come 
One Man endured, bound thrice ten years with woe, 
Yet from the Manger to the Cross was dumb ! 
130 



A WOODLAIlTD HOUE. 

' I ''HE stillness of the year in sweet decline ! 
"*■ (Precious of all things silence in its turn !) 
'T is like the loving rest for which we yearn 
When summer hopes no longer bloom and shine. 
In the soft shadow of this changeless pine 
The maple boughs have almost ceased to burn. 
How brown the brake ! yet this so delicate fern 
Is at its greenest. Peathery fair and fine 
It waves and floats these mossy trunks between— 
These trunks that veil the axeman's cruel scars ; 
(There are some lives that no misfortune mars !) 
Sweet day ! Against yon background dusky green 
That slender birch in the fair distance seen 
Shows like a twinkling cloud of yellow stars. 

131 



"SAVE THAT THEEE MAY BE ONE 
LOVE-GAENEEING BEEAST." 

O AVE that tliere may be one love- garnering 

^^ breast 

Will hold us unforgotten when we die, 

Erom all the paths that most familiar lie 

We shall be missed but few brief days at best. 

Noteless as noiseless pass we to our rest ; 

Slip from the ear and tongue as from the eye. 

Earth knows no break, no change to signify 

Absence or loss ; and Time and Nature, lest 

In our behalf remonstrant they appear, 

Make stealthy haste to blur and cover o'er 

The stone's laborious lettering before 

The yielding mound that settles year by year 

Is levelled, and the place — our last place here — 

That knew us once knows us indeed no more. 

132 



PEOPHECY. 

npHE glittering darkness of the perfect night 
-*- An hour before the break of perfect morn, 
When from her slowly-lessening, beauteous horn 
The brilliant moon pours forth a splendid light : 
So glows the radiance of inspired sight, 
Steadfast, serene, by weariness unworn 
And clear of every human doubt forlorn, 
Keeping Faith's vigil on imperial height — 
While sleeps the world below, unconscious, prone, 
Drunken with things of self and slothful time — 
Until Fulfilment's flood, like morning's prime, 
Through wondrous gates of Promise widely thrown 
KoUs in majestical from zone to zone 
And merges Prophecy in Light sublime. 

133 



THE MORNING CHAMBER. 

I. 

npHIS flower-like chamber, delicately walled, 
■*■ Of softest tints, low ceiled, wide and fair, 
Where pensive meditations seem installed 

Like cloistered nuns long-motionless in prayer ; 
This lovely chamber, looking south and east 

Across green seas of rippling foliage dense. 
Whose waiting windows catch the first and least 

Soft glimmer from that heavenly chamber 
whence 
The sun rejoicing cometh ; this sweet room, 

While folded yet in slumbers incomplete 
The whole fair house beside lies wrapt in gloom ; 

This morning chamber, high above the street, 
Day's silent glory floods and overflows 
With golden calm that crowns the night's repose. 

n. 

High noon ! and fuller floods of sunshine pour 
Into this shining chamber till it seems — 
The very hidden rafters, secret beams — 

To swim in splendor ! I but cross the floor 
134 



THE MORNING CHAMBER. 135 

And I forget 't is Winter, keen as clear. 
To the swift eyes of mine imagining 
Wide stand the windows, and the breath of 
Spring, 

Sweet courier of the violets, is here. 

I half resolve to hie me out and see 
How like a tiny army they possess 
The earth — the -violets, with their loveliness, 

When, of a sudden, breaks my reverie ! 

But the warm flood fills all the chamber yet, 

And ere it ebbs I will again forget ! 



in. 

Fair as the peace that like a river flows, 

Across the room the cloudless moonlight streams ; 
Kecess and corner dusk its hallowing beams 
Suffuse with mist-like glimmer of repose. 
So hushed this chamber, and so rapt this tide 
Of visible calm, that blessed visions rise 
Of the Great City of Peace beyond the skies, 
Of crystal waters that perpetual glide 
From out the Throne, swift light descending light 
Forever and forever, with a sound 
Of inconceivable music music-drowned 
In rain of benediction from the might 
And majesty of One enthroned above, — 
The Light of Light, whose Kame of Names is 
Love ! 



INSCEIBED 

TO J. W. AND C. H. 



O HUT in by clustering roofs and clustering trees, 

^^ Though not far off our blue bright river pours 

Its full swift volume 'twixt the gracious shores, 

How do I long on golden days like these 

For the wide vision of the crested seas 

Where the fleet swallow circles, dips, and soars ; 

Where flash the gull's white wings, the fisher's 

oars, 
And sails that shift and darken in the breeze ! 
Where the white surf along the glistening beach, 
And on the black rocks streaming from the spray, 
Tosses incessant far as eye can reach, 
And ceaseless murmurs most melodious pour, 
Swelling anon, anon to die away. 
While the sweet pines make answer evermore. 

n. 

Theee stands your cottage, peeping from the wood 
And facing all the splendors of the sea, 
On that dear spot where I to-day would be ; 
Above, below, azure of sky and flood ; 

136 



INSCRIBED TO J. W. AND C. H, 137 

Boundless seclusion, boundless solitude ; 

And in the midst what social feast for me 

To choice of speech or silence bidden free, 

While winds and waves rock every varying mood ! 

Through doors and windows wide, through all the 

house, 
What breeze-blown odors sweep of spice and balm. 
Hemlock and pine, cedar and wilding rose, 
And miles away the scent of meadow mows ! 
Exhaustless sweetness ; inexpressible calm ; 
The lapsing water murmuring, Eepose ! 



MISCELLANEOUS. 



AT THE STAND OF THE TIDE. 

T3AEED rocks ; gray sea; gray sky; 
•*-^ And stillness far and wide. 
No gleaming sail ; no snow-winged gull ; 
No glad returning tide. 

Is this tlie same fair shore 

Where I so often see 
The splendid waves display their crests 

Like crowns of victory ? 

The same wide sea, at morn 

Too burnished to behold, 
Or strewn with sunset's argosy 

Of ruby, sard and gold ? 

So still ! Not even stroke 

Of far-receding oar ; 
Only the gray mist stealing in, 

And settling more and more. 

Not even the lapsing sound 

That I am wont to hear 
Against the lonely kelp-hung ledge, 

Or the gray sands more near! 

141 



142 AT THE STAND OF THE TIDE. 

Only the gathering night, 

The lost horizon's rim ; 
Only a sense of solitude, 

Mysterious and dim. 

Hush ! comes there not a sound 

Along the sad sea's verge ? 
Not like the sighing of the wind, 

But one faint swelling surge. 

Ah, yes ! that sound again 
My quickened ear discerned! 

Darkness, but darkness thrilled with life ! 
The wondi'ous tide has turned ! 



THE FLIGHT OF THE BIRDS. 



/^ WISE little birds, how do ye know 
^^ The way to go, 

Southward and northward, to and fro ? 



Far up in the ether piped they : 

" We but obey 
One who calleth us far away. 

" He calleth and calleth year by year, 

Now there, now here ; 
Ever He maketh the way appear." 

Dear little birds ! He calleth me 

Who calleth ye : 
Would that I might as trusting be ! 

143 



MY NAMESAKE. 

TIj^ROM silvery clouds the silvery showers 
•^ Eell o'er the earth ; 
Stole softly forth the faint, sweet flowers 
Of April birth. 

An April babe my namesake came 

One April day ; 
Just claimed on earth her place, her name, 

And fled away. 

A few soft sighings of the breath 

And it was spent ; 
Too frail for life, too sweet for death, 

She came and went. 

So brief a stay, so swift a flight, 

Could scarce be felt ; 
Thus snowflakes falling light as light 

Touch earth and melt. 

If verily she hath been here 

We hardly know ; 

The frailest blossoms of the year 

Her days outgrow. 
144 



M7 NAMESAKE. 145 

Sweet month of soft unsorrowing sighs 

And fragrant breath ; 
Of tender, showery, brooding skies ; 

Of life, not death ; 

Her faint sweet memory entomb 

In violets, 
The pathos of whose faint perfume 

Breathes no regrets ! 

How strange to enter Paradise, 

As she to-day. 
With not one tear in those sweet eyes 

To wipe away ! 



EEIENDS. 

npHERE is only the river between us, dear, 
"*• And we can come and go. 
And though you are there and I am here 

I am filled with content, for I know 
You are moving brightly about the house 

Busy with many a task, 
And often alone in your fair sweet room 
In the morning light or the evening gloom 
You think of me. 
You pray for me, 
And, oh, what more can I ask ! 

Daily, indeed, I wish you were here, 
And when I am doubtful or vexed 
I long for your counsels calm and clear, 

But I do the thing that lies next. 
And He who is more than any friend 

Makes everything easy and straight, 
And it is not so hard as I feared to go 
In the way untried, and as long as I know 
You think of me 
And you pray for me, 
For everything else I can wait. 
146 



147 



FRIENDS. 

Some day I shall go to her, I say, 

Or she will come over to me ; 
In a little space I shall see her face, 

This very day it may be. 
So I will not mind the things unkind, 

The bitter that might be sweet, 
But strive with a better, braver heart 
To fight the good fight and bear my part, 
While she thinks of me 
And prays for me, 

And very soon we shall meet. 

Sometimes I ponder how it will be 

When you drift to some home afar ; 
And sometimes how when you are gone 

Where the saints and angels are, 
When another river shall flow between 

That never can be recrossed ; 
But still I say, whatever betide, 
Though earth may part us or death divide, 
She will think of me, 
She will pray for me ; 

My friend can never be lost. 



Eor friendship to live must be to love, 

To remember must be to pray, 
So living or dying your prayers must be mine 

And mine must be yours alway. 



148 FRIENDS. 

And, q\ in tlie light of Paradise, 

Most faithful of friends, most dear, 
Unhindered by weakness or doubt^, and wise 
With the wisdom that sees not with earthly eyes, 
It surely must be 
You will pray for me 
As you could not pray for me here ! 



WHITE AZALEAS. 

A Z ALE AS — whitest of white! 
"^^ White as the drifted snow 
Fresh-fallen out of the night, 

Before the coming glow 
Tinges the morning light ; 

When the light is like the snow, 
White, 
And the silence is like the light ; 
Light, and silence, and snow, 
All — white ! 

White ! not a hint 
Of the creamy tint 

A rose will hold. 

The whitest rose, in its inmost fold ; 
Not a possible blush ; 
White as an embodied hush ; 
A very rapture of white ; 
A wedlock of silence and light. 
White, white as the wonder undefiled 

Of Eve just wakened in Paradise ; 
Nay, white as the angel of a child 

That looks into God's own eyes ! 

149 



MIDWINTER DAYS. 

TVT ID WINTER days ! how oft they bring 
iVX "VVith lengthening light a sense of spring 
However keen may be their sting. 

A vague, sweet sense that far below 
The secret wasting of the snow 
The sap already stirs to flow. 

The frozen sod seems thrilled with hope, 
And where the valleys sunward slope 
The buried rootlets blindly grope. 

Beneath the dim protecting pines 
Peep here and there still verdant vines 
Through rifts of ice, as day declines 

And pours a sudden ruby glow 

Through lovely woodland aisles that show 

A crimson path across the snow. 

The birds that tarry all the year 
Are twittering that spring is near ; 
And busy with their plans appear. 
150 



MIDWINTER DAYS. 151 

Storm-driven from some softer zone 
Anon the flash of wings unknown, 
And winter seems already flown! 

The air is full of prophecies, 
Soft-humming like Hymettus' bees, 
In days, midwinter days, like these ! 



THE LILACS. 



T T E AV Y with fragrance and with dew, 
"^ I see them in the moonlight pale, — 

The lilac-plumes that, two and two, 
Nod to the wind's low wail. 



Purple and white, I see them wave, — 
Purple for valor, white for truth j 

And far away I see a grave 

Where lies the flower of youth ! 

152 



IN SPEING-TIME. 

A LL rosy-white the orchard shows, 
•^^ All blossom-sweet the west wind blows, 
And sights and scents together bring 
To yearning hearts the joy of Spring. 

Through sunny vapors streams the sun, 
And lights and showers blend in one ; 
The fragrant rain through fragrance falls 
And grape-vines bud on sheltering walls. 

Out-warbling from his generous throat, 
The golden robin's golden note 
Calls to the lily and the rose 
Still greenly hid in leafy close. 

Hills capped with silence, as with snow, 
Catch laughter faint of brooks below ; 
With starry dandelions gay 
The meadows mimic night by day. 

Dim-cloistered in the odorous wood, 
A shadow-loving sisterhood, 
The wild flowers that the sun forswear 
Are pale as pious nuns with prayer. 

153 



154 ^^ SPRING-TIME. 

Like one refreshed by balmy sleep, 
Her inmost bosom warm and deep 
A-throb with beauty yet unborn, 
Earth breathes away the blissful morn. 

From sunny nooks that dream of bloom 
To where gray moss o'ergrows the tomb, 
Floats everywhere that precious breath-— 
The Life that ever conquers Death. 

This is the joy of Spring, indeed ; 
The witness glad to Word and Creed ; 
The lovely Parable of Earth 
That pointeth to Immortal Birth I 



LOVE'S VISITATION. 

TX/" AS ever yet the world so fair ! 

The long, sweet day ! the tender night ! 
A fragrant thrill pervades the air — 
Spring's ever newly waked delight. 

It floods the azure realm above ; 

It quickens all the sod below ; 
It is the very soul of Love, 

And song and bloom its overflow. 

No living thing unconscious named 
But knows the depth of this delight, 

And filled with joy and unashamed 
Leaves joy to fashion joy aright. 

The bluebird's note is all his own ; 

The thrush one matchless song repeats ; 
And murmurs Love translates alone 

Hint how the brooding dove-heart beats. 

At eve the stars grow dim with dreams ; 

At morn the wandering waysides blush ; 
More sweet the brook's low babble seems, 

Wed with the woodland's happy hush. 

155 



156 LOVE'S VISITATION. 

Beneatli the sapphire-gleaming arch 

Like mated swans the white clouds sail ; 

And consciously yon lovely larch 
Lets down her swaying vernal veil. 

And picturing scenes where lance and spur 
For Love their utmost valor spent, 

Lo ! in the fields a golden stir — 
The dandelions' tournament. 

As on the wings of old romance 

The pageant of the fields shall pass ; 

Where now the golden flowers glance 
Pale phantoms float across the grass. 

But each returning Spring of time 
Love — Love shall still he horn anew ; 

The spirit of an heavenly clime 
Crown earth with bridal bloom and dew. 



THE DOVES. 



"PEETTY doves, so blithely ranging 
-^ Up and down the street ; 
Glossy throats all bright hues changing, 
Little scarlet feet. 

Pretty doves ! among the daisies 

They should coo and flit ! 
All these toilsome, noisy places 

Seem for them unfit. 

Yet amidst our human plodding 

They must love to be ; 
With their little heads a-nodding, 

Busier than we. 

Close to hoof and wheel they hover, 

Glancing right and left, 
Sure some treasure to discover ; 

Eapid, shy, and deft. 

Eriendliest of feathered creatures, 

In their timid guise ; 
Wisdom's little silent teachers, 

Praying us be wise. 

157 



158 THE DOVES, 

Fluttering at footsteps careless, 

Danger swift to flee, 
Lowly, trusting, faithful, fearless, 

Oh that such were we ! 

In the world and yet not of it, 
Eeady to take wing, — 

By this lesson could we profit 
It were everything t 



SONG. 

•T^HE wind blows out of the west, 

"*■ The wind is merry and free ; 

It brings fair weather for us, love, 

Tair weather for thee and me. 

The sun shines out of the east 

And dances over the sea. 
The world 's a-glitter for us, love, 

A-glitter for thee and me. 

And now the world 's a-dusk, 
The nest unstirred on the tree ; 

The fair moon hangs at its full, love, 
And shineth for thee and me. 

159 



MY DEEAM. 

T DEEAMED that I drifted alone in a boat 
-■" Far out on the sea by night j 
I had neither rudder nor sail nor oar, 
And I lost the harbor light. 

I drifted and drifted on and on, 

I could only feel the swell 
Of the weltering wave that tossed my boat 

As if it had been a shell. 

"No sound could I hear, no sight could I see 

Save only the stars overhead ; 
But unfearing I laid me down to sleep 

In that narrow unstable bed. 

I sank into slumber as profound 

As theirs whom we say are '' no more "j 

No waking sense in body or soul 
To whisper when night was o'er. 

But I wakened at last, as if at the touch 
Of some watcher unseen but true, 

With the flood-light of day on the waters wide 
And above me the wondrous blue. 
160 



JWF DREAM. 161 

And the shore, the shore was close at hand ! 

More swift than the words are said, 
Where its gates of verdure seaward swung, 

Straight into the harbor I sped. 

Straight in under sails that swept along 

Like great wings eager in flight, 
With a steady breeze and a steady keel, 

And a thrilling sense of delight. 

Brighter and brighter the whole world grew, 

The splendor on sea and shore, 
And the harbor was glad with all manner of craft 

That danced for their voyages o'er. 

Again the touch of that watcher unseen, 
As I veered toward the waiting pier, 

And — I waked in the old familiar room, 
And found it was daybreak here ! 

At the morning meal I rehearsed it all, 

So real did the unreal seem, 
And one and another lightly cried, 

" I will interpret the dream.^' 

It matters little — the things that they said, 

But I know I often must be 
Tossed oh "the waves of this troublesome world/' 

Alone at night on the sea. 



162 MY DREAM. 

God grant that my faith may never fail, 
And when perils and darkness are past, 

Having fallen asleep with a holy hope, 
May I find a safe harbor at last ! 



A VIGIL. 



T^AE-K shore, and desolate sky 
^^ Unquickened by a star ; 
Sad sea where wandering sails are lost 
In night afar ! 

No human presence sweet, 
Nor other sound beside 
Save that to silence near akin— ■ 
The ebbing tide. 

Only a lonely wreck 

High on the lonely beach, 
Whose hopelessness defies at last 
The breaker's reach. 

O Earth that keeps no watch, 

O Heaven that lights no star, 
He is who cares for every sail. 
Each broken spar ! 

163 



I 



CONFIRMATION. 
DISTANT watcher by her dying bed 



' Miles, many miles away, 
Who could not hear another watcher say 

Her soul had fled, 

How should I know ! 
What messenger, as swift as thought, had sped 
To whisper at my bed-room door 
That hour, before the break of day, 

" She is no more ! " 
No step did come or go. 
I listened : all was deathly still ; 
Only the strange mysterious chill 
That tells the dawn at hand 
And the outrunning of the vital sand. 

Far-off a mufiSed clock was striking slow ; 

I counted : Four ; 
And then exhaustion ; for the watch was o'er. 



I woke at length to find 
The sun red-streaming through the blind. 
One wept beside me; *' This has come," she said, 
And would have read 

164 



CONFIRMATION. 165 

The bit of paper shaking in her hand, 
But that I checked her : " Oh, 

I understand ! 
I know, dear heart, I know ! " 
"But," weeping very sore, 

'* She died at four." 

"Yes: four." 



SUMMEE-TIME. 



O UMMER'S breath Las kissed the lovely bloom 
^^ From the apple-trees : 
Out of flower-cups, dripping with perfume, 
Sip the honey-bees. 

Where the vines are strung with roses red 

Dart the humming-birds ; 
Winds, like lovers, in the boughs o'erhead 

Whisper tender words. 

Clover-crested are the waves of grass 

Where the little feet 
"Frolic, deep in coolness, as I pass 

From the sunny street. 

When at eve o'er field and fen and brake 

Misty curtains fall. 
Fire-flies, in their meteor dances, make 

Nightly carnival. 

166 



CKADLE SONGS. 

I. 

OLEEP, sweetest babe, and dream 
^^ In the red firelight's gleam ; 

The storm clouds fill the sky. 
Thou canst not dream of harm, 
Soothed by the mother-charm, 

A tender lullaby. 

Sleep ! Though the wild wind blows 
And drifts the blinding snows, 

All feathery soft they lie. 
The rhythm of the sleet 
Reaches thy hushed retreat, 

A gentle lullaby. 

Close to thy mother's side 
Sleep, warm and satisfied ; 

How sweet thy baby sigh ! 
Dear dove! the storm is o'er; 
The waves lisp on the shore, 

A ceaseless lullaby. 

Sleep! Earth no more is drear 
Since that sweet Babe was here 
Whose angels thronged the sky. 

167 



168 CRADLE SONGS. 

Sleep ! Only mothers know 
That night of long ago 
When Mary, bending low, 
Sang Jesu's lullaby. 



II. 

Sleep, little sunny head! 
The morning hours have sped ; 

The noonday sun climbs high. 
The summer breezes sweet 
Winnow the waving wheat, 

A murmuring lullaby. 

Sleep, little cradled head ! 
Sleep in thy wee white bed, 

While mother watches nigh. 
The rustling summer rain 
Whispers a soft refrain, 

A soothing lullaby. 

Sleep ! Wake and sleep again ! 
No longer croons the rain ; 

The sun drops down the sky ; 
Sleep, sleep, and sleeping hear 
The angels fluting near — 

Celestial lullaby. 



CRADLE SONGS. 169 

Sleep, nested like a dove, 
Babe on the breast of love ! 

The mild moon rideth high ; 
The whole world sleeps but one 
Whose watch is never done, 
Whose waking heart sings on 

Love's endless lullaby. 



SWEET-PEAS. 

O WEET-PEAS ! Sweet-Peas ! 
^^ The very sweetest of all sweet things ! 
Airily poised, like butterfly wings, 
On the slender stem. 
And now they brood in a still delight ; 

And anon, as the light wind touches them. 
They tremble and flutter, as feigning flight. 
In coyness — not affright. 
And lest they fly, 
The tricksy Zephyr passes by 
With a little moan of make-believe, 
And pretends to die 
Among the cherry-trees ! 
They only smile — they will not grieve, 
The gay and shy 
Sweet-Peas ! 

Sweet-Peas ! Sweet-Peas ! 
The very sweetest of all sweet things ! 
Perfect pink and perfect white ; 
Exhaling a perfume so rare, so pure. 
It ceaseth never to allure, 
Nor faileth ever to satisfy j 
170 



SWEET-PEAS. 171 

Like a breath of immortality, 
Like a hint of youth unspent for aye ; 
Of love — Ah, well-a-day ! 
Say, ye sweetest of all sweet things, 
Sweet-Peas, 
What are ye likest ? — what like ye ? 
The dream of Beauty^ the wonder that clings 
To snowy-lidded Innocence — 
These mystic nebulae 
(Souls of flowers to be), 
Lightly drifted hence. 
And mingling straightway they became 
Visible in pink and white, 

In dainty-delicate forms like these, 
And gat themselves a name ; 

Dew-christened in laver of morning light, 
"Sweet-Peas!" 

Sweet-Peas ! Sweet-Peas ! 
Here is a handful for her to wear 
Who is sweet like them, and more stately-fair. 
Lie, nosegay of blushes, mid snows of lace, 
And match the bloom of her maiden face 
When cometh her own sweetheart to share 
The posy modest and debonair. 
Whose dear bestowal shall bring him ease 
And sweet assurances. 
Dispelling sweet anxieties, 
Sweet-Peas ! 



172 SWEET-PEAS. 

And will ye have a sweetheart too, 

Sweet-Peas, Sweet-Peas? 
Then here 's Zephyr come back to woo, 
If you please ! 
Kay, but Zephyr is a flirt ! 

Make again your winged threat 
Till in very truth he fret — 
What's the hurt? — 
And die among the cherry-trees 
For love of you, 

Sweet-Peas! 



INCOGNITA. 



VEILED in verse, who knows 
Whether I smile or weep ? 
Slippered in fancies, who can tell 
What measure of step I keep ? 

Lift the veil, dear Love ! 

To thee I will show my face ; 
Hark, and thine ear shall surely hear 

My heart's inaudible pace ! 

173 



HELIOTEOPE. 

O WEETEST, sweetest Heliotrope ! 
*^ In the sunset's dying splendor, 
In the trance of twilight tender, 
All my senses I surrender 

To the subtle spells that bind me : 
The dim air swimmeth in my sight 
With visions vague of soft delight ; 

Shadowy hands with endless chain 
Of purple-clustered bloom enwind me 5- 
Garlands drenched in dreamy rain 
Of perfume passionate as sorrow, 
And sad as Love's to-morrow ! 
Bewildering music fills mine ears — 
Faint laughter and commingling tears — 
Plowing like delicious pain 
Through my drowsy brain. 
Bosomed in the blissful gloom 

Meseems I sink on slumberous slope 
Buried deep in purple bloom, 
Sweetest, sweetest Heliotrope I 
174 



DAY-LILIES. 

OSUMMEE day, 
Delay! delay! 
One waving of thy brooding wing, 
One stirring of thy hazy wing, 

And noontide light and heat 
Will find my dewy shadow-lair, 

And burn the coolness from the grasses 

That swathe my feet 

In rank and billowy masses ; 
And to this claustral twilight bring 
The sun's profanest glare. 

O summer day, 

Delay ! delay ! 
Let naked hill and bare brown field 

Parch in thy torrid ray. 
So this dim nook be unrevealed, 

Where I, 
Deliciously concealed, 

Among the lilies lie. 

The delicate Day-lilies ! 

The white and wonderful lilies ! 

My dark green haunt so still is 

175 



176 DAY-LILIES. 

The wildest birdling dare not sing, 
Nor insect beat a gossamer wing, 
Nor zephyr lift the lightest thing, 

Here, where the lustrous lilies, 

The clear, resplendent lilies, 
Pour out their heavenly-sweet perfume, 

And with their snowiness, 
In clusters chaste, illume 

This dusk recess. 

Soft-footed Silence, royal nun ! 

In this thy humid, emerald cell 

Porever dwell ! 
These flowers supernal ever shine, 
Pure-flamed, before thy virgin shrine I 
Here, one by one, 

Tell o'er thy glistering, roral beads, — . 

A rosary strung on tangled weeds 

And blades and stems that intertwist. 
The breath of lilies be thy prayers, 
Sweet-odored, wafted unawares 
Up through the morning's lucent airs 

And evening's pallid mist ! 
The glittering stars shall o'er thee pass, 
Deep-pillowed in the heavy grass ; 

These broad, smooth lily-leaves shall be 

A glossy coverlet for thee, 

Thy prayers and penance done, 
O royal nun ! 



DAY-LILIES. 177 

By day or night, 

In dark or light, 
Thy fragrant shrine shall be the same ; 

These slender tapers lambent still, 

Nor blazing sun, nor mildew chill, 
Shall quench their alabaster flame. 

A gleam, as of a crystal wand ! 

And Day peers in with curious face ; 
The jealous sunshine, stealing round. 

Doth warily chase 

The cool, dank shadows on the ground ; 
The cloister-walls no longer stand ; 

A garish glory fills the space. 
And lights the lush grass, loose and long ; 
And startled by the wild bird's song, 

Soft-footed Silence flees apace ; 
But still serene the lilies shine. 
Pure-flamed, before her ruined shrine ! 



THE CEICKETS. 



"piPE, little minstrels of the waning year, 
■■■ In gentle concert pipe ! 

Pipe the warm noons ; the mellow harvest near ; 
The apples dropping ripe ; 

The tempered sunshine and the softened shade ; 

The trill of lonely bird ; 
The sweet sad hush on Nature's gladness laid ; 

The sounds through silence heard ! 

Pipe tenderly the passing of the year ; 

The summer's brief reprieve ; 
The dry husk rustling round the yellow ear ; 

The chill of dawn and eve ! 

Pipe the untroubled trouble of the year ; 

Pipe low the painless pain ; 
Pipe your unceasing melancholy cheer ; 

The year is in the wane ! 
178 



THE LINGERINa OCTOBER WEATHER. 

T^O you recall our pleasant walk, 
^^ The last, dear friend, we took together, 
Our leisurely pace, our quiet talk, 
The lingering October weather ? 

How still the world was ! Not a breath 

To lift a leaf or float a feather ; 
A hush of happiness, not death, 

That lingering October weather. 

While like some frolic creature tied 
By sweet content's unconscious tether, 

Your little one walked close beside 
That lingering October weather. 

The lazy crows above our head 

Went slowly sailing through the ether; 

The dry leaves rustled at our tread 
That lingering October weather. 

We followed up the winding road 

Where shore and river kissed each other, 

And Nature's peace our hearts o'erflowed 
That lingering October weather. 

179 



180 THE LINGERING OCTOBER WEATHER. 

Against the background of the pines 
The birch and maple leaned together; 

A flame ran through the blackberry vines 
That lingering October weather. 

Fair vistas opened either side, 

Of hill or stream, or both together ; 

But one the hush on wood and tide 
That lingering October weather. 

The distant mountain seemed a cloud 
Or like a melting opal rather, 

With such a gracious light endowed, 
That lingering October weather. 

I looked upon your happy face ; 

I watched you as we walked together ; 
I thought : She fills so fair a place ! 

That lingering October weather. 

With dancing eyes in swift surprise 
You stoo23ed a wilding rose to gather ; 

A rose, the pet of summer skies, 

Still blooming through October weather ! 

I thought how like the rose you were ! 

Though youth and summer fly together, 
No frost, I said, will visit her. 

But lingering October weather. 



KNITTING SONa. 

OTITCH by stitch and row on row, 

^^ This is the way the stocking must grow. 

Clickety, clickety, day by day 

The slender, glittering needles say. 

Hush-a-bye, Baby, Grandmother sings ; 

Hither and thither the cradle swings. 

Pearl and plain and plain and pearl, 
Be it for boy or be it for girl ; 
Two and two is a neat device ; 
Learn to shift the thread in a trice. 

Hush-a-bye, Baby, Grandmother sings ; 

Hither and thither the cradle swings. 

Inch by inch the long leg grows, 
Straight and narrow for fitting close ; 
A very poor leg, is the saying well known, 
That cannot shape a sock of its own. 

Hush-a-bye, Baby, Grandmother sings ; 

Hither and thither the cradle swings. 

181 



182 KNITTING SONG. 

Count the stitches and halve them now, 
And one half set in a single row, 
And back and forth, outside and in, 
Knit the heel on the single pin. 

Hush-a-bye, Baby, Grandmother sings ; 

Hither and thither the cradle swings. 

Knit it long and narrow midway 
To round it ; and bind it off, as we say ; 
Take up the loops on either side 
And add a few more to make it wide. 

Hush-a-bye, Baby, Grandmother sings ; 

Hither and thither the cradle swings. 

Now each side narrow or slip and bind, 
To shape the instep, as you will find ; 
Then knit straight on till you near the toe j 
This is the way the foot must grow. 

Hush-a-bye, Baby, Grandmother sings ; 

Hither and thither the cradle swings. 

Then narrow once more, and narrow away, 

Toeing it off, as knitters say. 

There is a stocking fit for an heir ! 

Now knit the mate for he must have a pair ! 
Hush-a-bye, Baby ; when you are grown 
Your feet may be worthy to climb to a throne ! 



LOVE FOR LOVE. 
FOK A CHILD. 

/^H the old moon will rise not yet; 
^^ 'T is a weary, weary old moon 
And late, late up ; but we will not fret, 
The new moon will shine for us soon. 

And "where is the new moon,'' pet ? 

" And where does the old moon go ? '' 
They never are parted, they never met, 

But each from the other they grow. 

In her bosom the old moon yet 
The new moon shelters and warms, 

And the fair young moon — she will not forget 
But rise with the old in her arms ! 
183 



DEDICATION OF A GUEST-BOOK. 

TO J. W. A. 

TN this book I pray you see 
•*■ Not what is, but what may be, 
When on these expectant pages, 
Poets, scholars, priests and sages, 
And the friends who only claim 
At your hands that gracious name, 
As your guests from day to day 
Chronicle in brief their stay. 
Of this goodly company 
As the herald reckon me. 

Wit and wisdom, prose and verse, 
Graceful lyric, proverb terse. 
From the pens of kith and kin, 
Swell the pleasant store within — 
Cherished names and names renowned 
Make these barren leaves abound ; 
Year by year the volume grow 
Till it reach its overflow ! 
But however rich at last 
As a record of the past, 
Richer record will it be 
Of your hospitality. 

184 



DEDICATION OF A GUEST-BOOK. 185 

Life that shifts with wind and tide 
Keep for you one steadfast side ; 
One thing keep untouched by pain ; 
All your friends your friends remain ! 
Keep your home that happy spot 
Where old ties are unforgot ; 
Where no link of love is lost ; 
Where no trust by doubt is crossed. 
This dear boon to consummate 
Holy angels guard your gate ! 



TWO MEK 



I. 



T OSSES on losses, fast they came ; 

-■— ' Men said : " There 's left him but his name ; 

But that is free from blot or blame." 



Despairing, bowed with care and dread, 

As if he heard, he raised his head ; 

" Thank God, I have my name ! " he said. 



II. 

A palace ; gilded ease and glare ; 

Loud jests and laughter ; banquets rare ; 

Dark hints of foul beneath the fair. 

At daybreak, on a sleepless bed, 
He moaned and turned his fevered head ; 
" I Ve all things but a name ! " he said. 
186 



THE BABY I LOVE. 

npHIS is the baby I love ! 
■*- The baby that cannot talk ; 

The baby that cannot walk ; 
The baby that just begins to creep ; 
The baby that 's cuddled and rocked to sleep ; 

Oh, this is the baby I love ! 

This is the baby I love ! 

The baby that 's never cross ; 

The baby papa can toss ; 
The baby that crows when held aloft ; 
The baby that 's rosy and round and soft ! 

Oh, this is the baby I love ! 

This is the baby I love ! 

The baby that laughs when I peep 

To see is it still asleep ; 
The baby that coos and frowns and blinks 
When left alone — as it sometimes thinks ; 

Oh, this is the baby I love ! 

187 



188 THE BABY I LOVE. 

This is the hahy I love ! 

The baby that lies on my knee 

And dimples and smiles at me 
While I strip it, and bathe it, and kiss it — oh ! — 
Till with bathing and kissing 't is all aglow ; 

Yes, this is the baby I love ! 

This is the baby I love ! 

The baby all freshly dressed ; 

That waking is never at rest ; 
That plucks at my collar and pulls my hair 
Till I look like a witch, but I do not care ; 

Oh, this is the baby I love ! 

This is the baby I love ! 

The baby that understands ; 

And dances with feet and hands 
And a sweet little whinnying eager cry 
For the nice warm breakfast that waits it close by ; 

Oh, this is the baby I love ! 

This is the baby I love ! 

The baby that tries to talk ; 

The baby that longs to walk ; 
And oh ! its mamma will wake some day 
To find that her baby has — run aivay ! 

My baby — the baby I love ! 



LINES WRITTEN IN A HOUSE-BOOK. 

FOR E. C. S. 

T T ERE by the singing sea 

•*■ -^ No other voice should be heard, 

Whether a poet's rhyme 

Or the note of a passing bird ; 
So I leave on this silent page 

Only a written word. 

189 



EETUENED. 

/^^NCE more returned. The rustling stillness 

^^ round 
Of this old-fashioned garden, and the grace 
That indefinable o'erhangs the place, 

Each subtle odor and each nameless -sound, 

Each single whisper of each single tree, 

Each nook made cool with shade or warm 

with sun, 
Notes, (I could almost sing them one by one,) 

Notes are they all in one sweet harmony, 

Eamiliar through how many changeful years ! 
The ample house, each cool inviting room, 
As well as garden-ways of tangled bloom, 

Another harmony of love and tears ! 

Ah, should I wander far as heaven's blue dome 
Eoofs any phase of life or varying clime, 
And then, unknowing, at the end of time 

Keturn, I should cry out : Why, this is home I 

190 



IK AUTUMN". 

npHE cool, bright days, 
-*• The calm, bright days, 
With their liberal-hearted noons ! 
The clear, still nights, 
The restful nights. 
With their greatening harvest-moons ; 
And the ghostly rustle of withered corn 
Plucked of its ivory ears and shorn 
Of the floating fringes that tossed and swayed 
When the ripening summer zephyr played 
Through the ranks that shone in the summer 
morn — 

The beautiful corn ! 

The golden days ! the golden days ! 
Warm with sunshine and dreamy with haze ; 
Warm with the sunshine and cool with the breeze ! 
Like troops of tropical butterflies 
Clouds of leaves from the gorgeous trees 

Mutter and fall, 
And cover the earth with splendid dyes 
Matching the marvels of sunset skies. 

191 



192 i^' AUTUMN. 

Swell beyond swell tlie hills uplift — 
The hills serene ; 
Slope beyond slope they ebb away 
Into the distance azure-gray ; 
And over them all, 

Through veils of amethyst vaguely seen 
Magical lights incessantly shift, 

Moved by the wonder hands of Day — 
Over the hills serene ! 

No ripple breaks 
The lucid lakes 
Up from whose margins the gay banks climb — 

Into whose deeps the shadows descend 
Like sunken gardens in their prime, 
Whose softly-pictured terraces end 
In emerald grottos where Naiads dream 
While the unstirred rushes over them stream. 
From the woodbine draping the cottage thatch 
The wandering winds as they pass, 
Tenderly, one by one, detach 
Leaves of crimson that flame in the sun : 

One by one, 
Slowly downward they waver, and twirl, 
And alight on the trampled grass. 
Day by day the vine-leaves curl 
E-evealing the heavily hanging grapes 
In tempting clusters of rarest shapes, 
That out of the heart of summer grew ; 



IN AUTUMN. 193 

Duskj-purple and amber-white, 

Warmed in the nooning and cooled in the night, 

Mingled of honey, and sunlight, and dew. 
The breeze through the orchard-alley sweeps. 
And russet-brown leaves in dusty heaps 

Eddy and whirl ; 
And russet-brown apples, and rosy-cheeked. 
Fall from the ruddy half-rifled bough, 
Strewing the grassy patch 
With its footpath trail below. 
Where the bare-headed, sunburnt farmer's girl 
Gathers the fairest and leaves the rest 
For the gold-brown bee in his honey quest. 
And the zealous ants that busily swarm 
Over the bruises mellow and warm ; 
While chicks full feathered and yellow-beaked 
E-oam in the sunshine and leisurely scratch 
For the helpless worm withdrawing its coil 
Lazily into the loosened soil. 

Streaming in at the wide barn door 
Warm lies the sun on the well-worn floor 
Scattered with wisps of straw and grain 
From the generous wain. 
Heaped high as the rafters the sweet-smelling hay 
O'erhangs the bursting loft, 
And a breath from the orchard croft 
Stirs the loosened spears, and they drop away 
Noiselessly-soft ! 



194: /iv AUTUMN. 

The mellow days ! the mellow days ! 
The brown seed ripens and bursts the pod ; 

The brown seed ripens, the stem decays, 
The black root rotting under the sod. 
The lattice o'er-straggled by faded vines 

Leans to its fall, 
And here and there by the garden wall 
And beside the late-neglected walks, 
Amid blackened weeds and mouldering stalks 
Where the fly in his mail of emerald shines. 

Flowers of garish beauty bloom 

Like torches that flare at the mouth of a tomb. 
Phantom of summer, silver fair, 
Peacefully restless through the air 
With the unseen currents that softly flow 
Drifts the thistle-down to and fro. 

The yellow days ! the yellow days ! 
Fields of stubble and naked ways ! 
The year's last gold 
On the uttermost bough 
Flutters mournfully now ! 
The sumach that burned like the bush of old 

Is almost stripped of its fire ; 
And trampled out by the rains that beat 
The sodden paths with their million feet 
The last bright hues expire ! 



MY PICTUKE. 

■pLOWERS tossing, swaying, tossing, 
-*- Larkspur, lilies, poppies, phlox, 
Boses, pinks, and coreopsis. 

Foxglove, cornflowers, hollyhocks, 
All old-fashioned as the place is 
With its pretty terraced spaces. 

And beyond and all about it, 

For the background of its bloom, 

Just the grass and trees that make it 
Such a picture for my room ! 

All unguessed from where the street is 

Its seclusion very sweet is. 

But by far its fairest feature 
Is the hemlock grove and pine • 

That the garden half overshadows 
In the golden day's decline ; 

Very fair the ever-shifting 

Sunbeams through the dark pines sifting. 

Velvet -like the seal-brown carpet 

Woven year by year below. 
When the garden's bloom has vanished, 

195 



196 MT PICTURE. 

Covered with, a sheet of snow 
Over which, the shadows playing 
Eival summer's soft arraying. 

This my picture, ever-changing, 
Never, never quite the same, 

Heaven's own azure for its canvas 
And my window-sash its frame. 

Dear old-fashioned homestead garden, 

And the woods — my Fancy's ArdenI 



THE HOME AMONG THE HILLS. 

IVl ID WAY between these towering hills 

■^ One lonely human dwelling j 
The circling acres, culture swept, 
Its little history telling ! 

On either hand the meadow land 
Makes fair the mountain spaces 

With golden reach of buttercups 
And silver drift of daisies. 

Behind, the massive forest waU ; 

Before, the river running ; 
And close about the little cot 

The signs of human cunning : 

The signs so homely and so sweet 

That draw us to each other, ' 
And make the daily life of man 

Eamiliar to his brother. 

We know the hand at early morn 
That cottage hearth-fire kindling ; 

We watched the dropping of this corn ; 
We wait its purple spindling ! 

197 



198 THE BOMB AMONG THE HILLS. 

A part have we in all the toils 
Of these our mountain neighbors ; 

A portion in the precious gain 

Heaven winnows from their labors. 

We taste their trials, share their feasts, 
And with a passing wonder 

We linger even while we go, 

Their choice, their lot to ponder. 

Amid the grandeur and the gloom 

On every hand abiding, 
A flower of human blossoming 

This little home is hiding. 

What tender wind of Providence 
The small seed hither drifted 

Where yet these shadows vast may fall 
On village spires uplifted ? 

Less awful seem those hills august, 
Less lone the valley's glooming, 

Since in this wilderness the rose 
Of human life is blooming ! 



A HARVEST HYMN. 

WRITTEN FOR THE AMESBURY AND SALISBURY 
AGRICULTURAL EXHIBITION, SEPT. 17, 1860. 

/^ HAPPY day returned once more 
^-^ With golden plenty still replete ; 
As though she never gave before 

Earth pours her treasures at our feet. 

And ne'er did ruddier fruit fulfil 

The rosy prophecies of May ; 
Ne'er did the rugged lands we till 

Yield sweeter corn or flowers more gay. 

Not one among the many here 

Who prune the tree or plough the soil, 

But has some share in Nature's cheer, 
Some liberal recompense for toil. 

Yet none his choicest stores may boast 
Of flowers or fruit or garnered grain, 

For labor of his hands were lost 

Unblest by heaven's refreshing rain. 

199 



200 A HARVEST HYMN, 

Oil thanks to God whose love abides 
And scatters bounties everywhere ; 

Who in the heart of Nature hides 
The germ of His unfailing care ! 

More rich than Autumn's robe of leaves 
Should be the garments of our praise, 

And ampler than her ample sheaves 
The charities that crown our days. 

More fragrant than the meadow's breath 
The incense of our souls should rise 

From life's rude altars wreathed by Faith 
With borrowed bloom from Paradise. 

Oh, clearly then could we behold 

In flowers that fade and fruits that fall 

Sweet hints which earthly gifts infold 
Of treasure stored in Heaven for all. 



TO JOHN G. WHITTIER 
ON HIS EIGHTIETH BIRTHDAY. 

T^EAE, Sponsor of my early songs, 
^^ The grace that to thy muse belongs 
I covet for thy sake this day 
When thou art crowned anew with bay. 

Sweet singers sing thy name once more 
As if it were unsung before, 
And I would add my grateful lay, 
Dear Poet, crowned anew with bay. 

Thy friends around thee warmly press, 
And those who know thee not no less 
Their far-off homage seek to pay, 
O Poet, crowned anew with bay. 

The East and West their greetings pour 
Like waves that break along the shore 
In lavish floods of surf and spray, 
O Poet, crowned anew with bay. 

Yet length of days, itself a crown, 
Thy noble life, thy name's renown, 
Make paltry all that we can say, 
And even this thy crown of bay. 

201 



202 TO JOHN G. WHIT TIER. 

But oh ! another crown that gleams 
Beyond the poet's fairest dreams 
Awaits thee, and almost to-day 
Transfigures this thy crown of bay. 

How kindle thy prophetic eyes 
As with a vision of that prize, 
The crown that fadeth not away 
rore-shadowed in thy crown of bay. 



WOMAJSr. 

1862. 

A S though no shade of human wrong fell darkly 
■^^ on their beauty, 
And all men walked in brotherhood the shining 

ways of duty, 
The blessed summer days glide by in calm and 

sweet succession ; 
God writes on Nature's palace-walls no curse 

against oppression. 

The strong man arms him for the fight ; he hears 

the bugle calling ; 
And while between "the patriot-shouts her tears 

have time for falling, 
Pale woman plies the threaded steel nor shapes 

her lips to singing, 
But still with every stitch she draws the pearls of 

prayer is stringing. 

She thinks of those whose wounds are fresh; of 

those in death-sleep lying, 
Whose brows of youth and manhood won their 

brightest crowns in dying ; 

203 



204 



woman: 



She thinks of others brave and true hid in the 

smoke of battle, 
Where bayonets gleam and cannon roar and 

bullets hiss and rattle. 



She shudders while the words of fate along the 
wires are chasing, 

Or trembling waits the hurried line some comrade 
may be tracing ; 

Her heart grows faint ; she lifts her hands in an- 
guished imploration ; 

" God save my soldier ! " first she prays, and then^ 
" God save the nation ! " 



And when she moans, " The very thought of loss 

doth overcome me ! '^ 
Crying, " If it be possible, oh let this cup pass 

from me ! " 
God chides her not if, choked with sobs, she adds 

to her petition 
But brokenly Christ's after-words of meekness and 

submission. 



He saw her pale with victory in the dark hour of 

trial. 
When Self lay slain, and sorrowing Love was 

fettered with denial ; 



WOMAN. 205 

And the Divine One who alone can clearly read 

the human, 
Traces the Hero's autograph though tear-blots of 

the Woman. 



ABEAHAM LINCOLN. 

1865. 

73 EST, rest for him whose noble work is done ; 
■''^ For him who led us gently unaware 
Till we were readier to do and dare 
For Freedom, and her hundred fields were won. 

His march is ended where his march began : 
More sweet his sleep for toil and sacrifice 
And that rare wisdom whose beginning lies 

In fear of God and charity for man : 

And sweetest for the tender faith that grew 
More strong in trial, and through doubt more 

clear, 
Seeing in clouds and darkness One appear 

In whose dread name the Nation's sword he drew. 

Rest, rest for him ; and rest for us to-day 

Whose sorrow shook. the land from east to west 
When slain by Treason, on the Nation's breast 

Her martyr breathed his steadfast soul away. 
206 



ABRAHAJII LINCOLN. 207 

O fervent heart ! cool and patient head ! 

shoulders broad to bear all others' blame ! 

Mercy disguised herself beneath his name, 
And Justice through his lips like Pity plead. 

His truth could snare the wiliest of the earth ; 
His wit outweigh the ponderous debate j 
By sneers unvexed, in triumph unelate, 

He stood our chief in place, our chief in worth. 

Behold, kingdoms of the world, behold, 
O mighty powers beyond the swelling wave, 
How fast as rain on his untitled grave 

The tears of millions mingle with the mould ! 

Such love a prince might crave, such homage seek ; 
The people's love that clothed him like a king, 
The grateful trust those hands were swift to bring 

Whose brokeu fetters of deliverance speak. 

Four years ago unknown — to-day how dear ! 
Pour years that tried him with a century's strain, 
While Treason led his wretched hosts in vain 

And turned Assassin when his doom was near. 

Four little years whose space a thought may span ; 
A niche in Time's vast hall where he doth stand, 
To win applause in every age and land, 

" The noblest work of God — an honest man." 



EPITAPH ON ALBERT LAIGHTON. 

TN heart of home his muse upsprang, 
"*■ And folded there her lovely wings ; 
In heart of home he ever sang, 
In heart of home he ever sings. 
208 



NOV 14 1911 



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